


Still Looking Up

by justkisa



Category: Football RPF, MCFC RPF
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-23
Updated: 2012-11-23
Packaged: 2017-11-19 08:40:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 24,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/571349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justkisa/pseuds/justkisa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louise falls in love first and tries to figure out what to do with her life second and, in the end, it all works out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Still Looking Up

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. Written for [footballhetfest](http://footballhetfest.livejournal.com/)
> 
> 2\. Many thousands of thanks to the ever-wonderful [ladytelemachus](http://ladytelemachus.livejournal.com/) for the beta.

When Emma whispers, “He fancies you, you know?” Louise has no idea who she’s talking about.

“What? Em, who?” 

Emma hooks her arm through Louise’s and says, “God, Lou, didn’t you see him staring when we went past?” 

“What?” 

She peeks back, or starts to, but Emma hisses, “No. Don’t look.”

“Em, I don’t know--”

“Gareth, from around the corner,” Emma interrupts, “the one that plays footie, you know, with Brighton, he fancies you.”

Louise laughs because Gareth Barry barely looks at her when she sees him and he’s never said a word to her, not one. “Oh, Em, don’t talk nonsense. He does not.”

“I’m telling you, Lou,” Emma says stubbornly, “He does. He’s forever staring at you.”

Louise laughs. “Sure, Em, whatever you say.” She tugs on her arm. “Let’s go see what my mum has for tea.”

If, after that, she looks a bit more at Gareth Barry when she sees him around with his mates, that’s nobody’s business but hers. He’s really not half bad to look at. 

She runs into him one Sunday afternoon, not long after school’s let out for the summer, as she’s walking back from Emma’s. He’s by himself. She’s not sure she’s ever seen him without his mates or his parents. He smiles at her, slow and a bit tentative. He has such a lovely smile and she smiles back without thinking. She keeps walking, though, assumes that’ll be that, but he stops and says, “Hiya.” She has to stop then and turn back toward him. “Louise,” he says, “Right?” 

“Yeah,” she says and sternly reminds herself that this doesn’t mean Emma was right, this doesn’t mean that Gareth Barry, who’s still smiling that lovely smile at her, fancies her. 

“Gareth,” he says, “I mean, I’m Gareth. I--”

“I know,” she says, though she’s sure Emma would say it was the completely wrong thing to say.

“Oh,” he says, “Right. Well, good to see you.”

“Right,” she says, “Good to see you as well.” She means to turn and go but he’s just stood there, staring at her, making no move to leave. ”I should,” she starts to say just as he says, “Look, would you, maybe, I mean--”

She stops talking. “Sorry,” they say at the same time. He’s blushing a bit. She’s charmed by that even as she orders herself not to be. “You, ah,” he says, “You were saying?” 

“No,” she says, “It’s all right. What--what did you...”

He ducks his head. “Was just, would you, maybe--” He looks back up. “Would you like to go somewhere, maybe, sometime, you know, with me?”

She can’t help it, she starts to laugh, because Emma was right and she’d been so sure she was wrong, because she’d told herself that there was no chance he’d ever look twice at her. He looks a bit abashed and she knows she should stop laughing, but she can’t seem to. Then he smiles a little and says, “Well, that was pretty much crap, shall I try again?”

She stops laughing. He doesn’t seem affronted by her laughter. He’s even smiling, giving her this lovely, hopeful grin. “Okay,” she says, “Try again.” 

He does and, this time, he’s much more coherent. “All right,” she says, when he’s done, “I mean, yes. Yes, I’d like that.” He gives her a stunned smile but doesn’t say anything. “I really,” she says, “I’ve got to go. My mum, she’s expecting me home for tea.”

“Right,” he says, “I’ll just, I’ll ring you, yeah?”

He turns to go. “Gareth,” she says. 

He turns back. “Yeah?”

“Shall I give you my number then?”

“Oh.” He ducks his head and, this time, he really does blush. “Shit, I mean, yes. Yeah, that’d be great and, you know, yeah.”

She manages to dig a pen out of her bag, but she hasn’t any paper. “Give me your hand,” she says before she can think better of it.

“What?”

“I’ve got no paper, so...”

“Oh, right, yeah, ‘course.” He holds out his hand. She almost loses her nerve and hands him the pen. He’s looking at her with such hopeful expectation and that emboldens her enough to step forward. 

It’s a bit awkward, just writing on his hand, his hand keeps moving, so she wraps her other hand around his wrist, just to hold his hand steady. He’s very warm and a bit sweaty. She writes the last number. “There,” she says and lets go of his hand.

“Right,” he says, “Thanks.”

She wants to stay, to linger a bit with him, but she’s late and her mum’s going to murder her as it is. “I’ve really got to go.” 

He smiles. “Right. Yeah. ‘Course. I’ll ring, okay?”

She smiles. “Yeah. Okay.” 

She’s half an hour late for tea and her mum yells at her for a good twenty minutes. 

She spends the night and the next morning telling herself he’ll never call. She doesn’t call Emma, even though she wants to, because she can’t bear the _I told you so_ s. He calls, though, just after lunch. Her mum picks up the phone. “Louise,” she says, face set in an expression that’s less than pleased, “There’s a Gareth on the phone for you.”

She ducks away from the look on her mum’s face and takes the phone. “Hello,” she says, trying not to sound too eager.

“Louise?” 

“Yeah,” she says and squeezes the phone as tightly as she can.

***

He takes her to the cinema, lets her pick the film and pays for the tickets. A half an hour or so in, he puts his arm along the back of her seat. His fingertips just brush the top of her shoulder. She shivers and feels too hot all at once. “You cold?” he whispers in her ear.

“No, I, it’s fine,” she whispers back. 

He wraps his arm around her shoulders. He’s a bit clumsy about it, but it’s still nice. “Better?” he says. 

She was never cold, but it’s still better. “Yes,” she says, “much. Thanks.” He leaves his arm there for rest of the film. 

On the walk home, he takes her hand then drops it. “Sorry. Sorry. I mean, can I, is it--” 

She takes his hand. “It’s fine.” 

He doesn’t say much as they walk, just lets her chatter away. She likes it, though, because what he does say shows he’s actually listening to her. It’s a nice change from the few other boys she’s gone with, who’d chattered on, usually about themselves, but who’d never seemed to hear a word she said.

They hold hands the whole way home. It gets a bit sweaty, but she doesn’t mind. When they reach her house, he smiles and says shyly, “I, uh, I had a nice time.” 

She squeezes his hand. “Me too.”

“So, uh--” He ducks his head and his hair falls into his eyes. “Would you like to, you know, do this again?”

“Yes,” she says, not caring how eager it makes her sound, “Very much.”

His smile takes over his whole face. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” she says.

“Well,” he says, “Goodnight,” and leans in and kisses her cheek. She turns before he can pull away and gives him a proper kiss. He makes a low, stunned sound but he kisses her back. It’s quite nice, actually, better than Eddie or Ray, both of whom just barged their tongues into her mouth and slobbered. He lets go of her hand and puts his hands on her waist. She can’t quite think past the kiss but she’s dimly aware of his hands, big and warm, splayed over her sides. 

He’s the one who finally ends the kiss. “Louise,” he says, “I, uh--” He licks his lips. She wants to kiss him again. He still has his hands on her and she wants to step closer and see what else he would do. She’s never wanted to do that with a bloke before. “I’ll, uh, I’ll call, yeah?”

She wants to say, _kiss me again, right now_ , but, instead, she says, “Yeah.” Her voice sounds breathless and stretched. She almost doesn’t recognize it. “Sounds good. I should--should go in, yeah?”

“Yeah,” he says, ”Right. Goodnight then.”

“Gareth,” she says, “you, ah--” She taps his hands, which are still on her waist.

“Oh,” he says, letting go, “Right. Sorry.” 

She gives in to impulse and tips up to kiss him. “Don’t be sorry.” She starts up the stairs. “Goodnight.” He’s still standing there, staring after her, when she shuts the door behind her.

The next day, she calls Emma, as early as she can get away with, and says, “I kissed him,” instead of saying hello, “And it was, God, Em, it was--”

“Wait. What?” Emma says, “Who’ve you been kissing?”

“Gareth Barry.”

“I told you,” Emma says, “Didn’t I tell you? Now start from the beginning and tell me everything.” She does. She tries to stay calm and not give into giddiness, but she’s pretty sure she doesn’t manage it.

***

For the summer, they’re together, it seems, more than they’re apart. They don’t really do anything all that exciting. They just go places around the neighborhood, to the cinema, out to eat. Anywhere they can walk to. If her mum’s out, she’ll invite him in and they’ll watch telly or, really, turn the telly on and make out on the sofa. She enjoys it, the kissing, and she thinks he does too. It’s exciting, being close to him like that, and he’s so sweet with her, lets her set the pace, never pushes her for anything more than kissing.

They actually spend a fair bit of time just walking around and talking. They’ll go down by the seafront or walk around the pier. He always holds her hand and she gets accustomed to the feel of it entangled with her own. It’s nice, really, talking with him. He’s not quite how she’d expected him to be. He’s quiet and, well, _steady_ ’s the best word she can think of, but he always seems interested in what she has to say and he has a surprising, sneaky sense of humor. He’s forever making her laugh. She likes the way he smiles when he gets her to laugh, like he can’t imagine anything better than making her happy, making her smile.

The one thing they never talk about, though, is football. She’s known boys who’d just played for school and the like who’d never shut up about it. Gareth plays for real, or close to, and he never talks about it. She asks him about it and he says, in that slow, serious way he sometimes has, “Well, with you, I wanna, I dunno, I want to talk with you, you know, about what you want to talk about, about other things.”

She kisses him right after, because forget telling her she’s fit or gorgeous, that might be the best thing a bloke’s ever said to her. When she pulls back he says, “Lou?”

“I like you, Gareth Barry,” she says, “Quite a bit.”

He smiles, dazed and a bit wondering, and says, “Well, that’s a relief, ‘cause I like you a fair bit as well.” She kisses him again.

The summer winds down and Gareth’s been coming around so much her parents insist on meeting him. He’s sober and polite. He compliments her mum’s cake and talks cricket with her dad. It goes disconcertingly well. After he leaves, her dad calls him a nice lad and her mum gives her a look she can’t quite read and says, “Come help me with the washing up.” 

As soon as they’re in the kitchen, her mum says, “Well, love, I see why you like him so well.” She turns on the water and starts on the first pan. “Hand me that plate, would you?” She does. “But, Louise, you’re young. Both of you. Don’t--don’t--” 

“What, Mum?”

Her mum sighs. “Don’t expect too much, all right, love?”

Louise wants to say she doesn’t - it’s even sort of true. “Mum,” she says, “Don’t, we’re--”

Her mum turns off the water and turns around. “I liked him, Louise, I did, just take it slow. Be realistic.” 

She looks so serious that Louise just says, “Okay, Mum.”

Gareth calls after supper and says nervously, “Well?”

She smiles. “They liked you.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

The summer dwindles and Gareth gets quieter. It worries her. Then, one day, he says, “Lou, we, ah, there’s something...”

In spite of the unusually warm day, she suddenly feels cold all over. She thinks of her mum, wash cloth in hand, telling her not to expect anything. He’s going to say something like _well it was fun for the summer_ or something else equally dreadful. “What?” she says, shrugging out from under his arm. He frowns at that, but he lets her go. “Gareth, what?” 

He looks at the ground. “Football, it’ll all be starting up soon, training, games and all, and school too.”

“Are you,” she says, because usually she finds his stumbling way of getting to the point charming, but not now, “breaking up with me, Gareth, ‘cause--”

“No! No, Lou, no ‘course not. Unless, I mean, do you, um, want to? I--” He sounds gratifyingly panicked.

“No,” she says, moving back close to him, “No. I don’t.”

“Good,” he says, smiling, “that’s--that’s really good.” 

She’s still nervous, though, because he was going to say something, wasn’t he? “What,” she says, “were you, I mean, about footie and all?”

“Oh,” he says, “Right. Just, was going to say it takes up a lot of time. I--I, we won’t be able to see each other as often, not--not like it’s been.” 

She hadn’t really thought about that, about what him playing for real might actually mean for them. “Oh,” she says, unsure what else to say, “Right. Of course.” 

“Do you still,” he says, “I mean, I’ll call and we’ll still, just it-- Lou?” He looks so hopeful.

“Of course," she says, tentatively settling her hands on his chest. She fancies she can feel his heart thumping against her palm. “Of course, I do.”

“Yeah?” he says, his face splitting in the smile she’s only seen him give to her.

“Yeah,” she says, and kisses him. He hauls her close and kisses her back in away he’s never kissed her before. It’s a bit desperate and not quite as nice as his other kisses but, somehow, still exciting. He’s holding her a little too tight, his fingers digging hard into her waist. “Gareth,” she says, gasps really, “Gareth, I, _oh_.” She clutches handfuls of his shirt, tries to steady herself. He looks a bit smug. She doesn’t know if she wants to kiss him again or kick him right in the shins.

“M’really glad,” he says, “you, that you, you know,” and she decides kissing him is a better notion than kicking him.

***

Gareth’s not wrong about how busy he gets. She’s lucky if she sees him once a week. He calls, though, not every day but near enough that her mum starts scolding her about all the time she spends on the phone.

Emma says, more than once, “Thought having an actual footballer for a boyfriend would be more exciting.”

“He’s not,” Louise always says, “Not really. Not yet.” 

He’s so busy with it, though, that it feels like he is. 

“I miss you,” she says, next time she sees him. She doesn’t mean to say it, but it slips out. 

He squeezes her a bit too tightly and says, “Miss you too.” 

It doesn’t help, not really, knowing that he misses her. She doesn’t see him for almost two weeks and she sits around the house wishing Gareth Barry and his lovely smile had stayed well away from her. Her mum finally says sternly, “Louise, I’ll not have you moping around all day, every day, because of that boy. Either you stop seeing him or you’re just going to have to get used to this. 

She sighs, because her mum is right and she hates it when that happens. “Just miss him,” she says. 

“Oh, love,” her mum says, coming to give her a hug, “I know.” She kisses her cheek. “But you’re a wonderful girl and there are loads of other boys.”

She loops her arms around her mum’s waist and holds on. “Don’t want any other boys. Just him.”

“Well then,” her mum says, setting her back with a bit of a shake, “You’re going to have to get used to this.”

She tries. 

A lot of the time, it works because, really, she does have a lot going on in her life aside from Gareth. She has school. This year maths is driving her mad, her teacher never makes any sense and maths has never really been her strongest suit. She has her mates. She still does all the things she did before Gareth. She still spends endless afternoons splayed across Emma’s bed, while they pretend to do their schoolwork, but talk or listen to music instead. She still goes out all the time with Emma and the rest of their mates. Really, in some ways, her life now is exactly as it was before that day when Gareth stopped her that day on the sidewalk. 

Except it’s not, not really, because Gareth’s made this space for himself in her life and now, so much of the time, that space is empty and she misses him. She misses the warmth of his smile, the way he makes her laugh, the way she feels when he kisses her. She wonders, sometimes, if it was worth it, letting him in, only to find herself missing him so much. They have stupid little rows about it, sometimes, about all the time he has for football and how little time he has for her. They never really resolve anything but, when she’s with him, or, when she talks with him, she can’t imagine being without him. 

Close to Christmas, he says, “Would you, maybe, want to come to a match sometime?” She’s a bit surprised - for all of his time that football demands, they still don’t talk about it much. 

“Sure,” she says, “Of course. How would I, I mean, I couldn’t just go all by myself, could I?”

He shrugs. “Could go with my dad, I guess.” 

“Your dad?” He nods. “Gareth, I’ve never even met your dad.”

He shrugs again. “You should, really, him and my mum.” He ducks his head. “They, uh, they really want to meet you, actually.”

She hopes that’s a good thing. “I’d, ‘course I’d like to meet them. They, uh, they really want to?”

He smiles. “‘Course they do. I talk about you to them all the time.” 

That’s definitely a good thing. “Okay,” she says, “Just tell me when.” 

It ends up being right before Christmas. He invites her for tea. She doesn’t know what to wear and, worse, is terrified of what she’ll say to his parents. Emma comes over and they go through half her wardrobe looking for something for her to wear. Her mum makes cake and presses it into her hands before she goes.

She almost drops the cake trying to ring the Barrys’ bell. Then Gareth opens the door. He’s smiling. She feels a little steadier, seeing him. He steals a kiss right there, her on the stairs, not even through the door. “Come in,” he says.

She holds out the cake. “My mum sent cake.” 

He takes it from her. “Oh, is it that one--”

She swats at him. “Of course it is.”

He smiles a bit sheepishly. “It’s just really great, that one.” He takes her arm. “C’mon, they’re just in the other room.

“Oh,” she says, suddenly feeling like she might not make it to the next room. 

He drops her arm and wraps his arm around her waist. “C’mon, Lou, it’ll be okay.” 

She nods. “Right. Sure.” 

He takes her through the house. It’s neat and tidy and decorated for Christmas. She barely sees it, though, too nervous to look properly. 

The introductions go well enough. Gareth hands over the cake and that prompts a smile from his mum. Gareth, she notes absently, has his mum’s smile. 

Tea is fine. She figures as long as she eating, she’s not saying anything out of turn. Gareth’s father is stern and solemn. He looks very much like Gareth. He doesn’t say much, hardly anything at all. Gareth’s mum, though, is really, very lovely and, once Louise gets over some of her nerves, quite easy to talk to. Gareth doesn’t say much but he’s there at her side, steady and solid. 

Mr. Barry finally, as things are winding down, says to her, “Gareth tells me he invited you to a match.” It’s the first thing he’s said to her since the introductions.

“Yes,” she says, “He did.” 

Mr. Barry nods. “If you’d like to go to one, I can take you.” He doesn’t quite seem enthused by the idea.

“Thank you,” she says carefully, “I’d like that.”

He nods again. “I’ll let you and Gareth work out the details.” He stands up. “I’ve got some things to take care of. It was nice to meet you, Louise.”

“You as well. Thank you for inviting me.” She glances at Mrs. Barry as she says it and tries to smile. Mr. Barry nods again and leaves.

Mrs. Barry smiles. “It really was nice to meet you. Gareth talks so much about you.”

“Mum,” Gareth says, sounding a bit embarrassed, “Please.”

Mrs. Barry laughs. Louise really quite likes her. “You do, though, love, and all that time you spend on the phone with her, I really had to meet her.”

“Thank you,” Louise says again, “For having me. Tea was lovely. I should really be going, though, thank you again.”

Mrs. Barry smiles. “Come back anytime.”

***

She doesn’t end up going to a match until after the New Year. Gareth arranges for his father to come pick her up and take her.

She doesn’t know what to wear. She yells that downstairs to her mum and her dad yells back up, “Dress warm, Louise.” She does her best. When she comes down, though, her dad looks her over and says, “Go put on a hat.” She doesn’t want to muss her hair but she does as he says. 

Her dad comes out with her when Mr. Barry arrives. They shake hands and make a bit of small talk. 

The ride to the ground is quiet and unbearably awkward. She tries to make a bit of conversation but Mr. Barry doesn’t seem interested. 

All the same, she’s glad of him when they get to the ground. It’s crowded and noisy and she’s no idea where to go or what to do. Mr. Barry guides her along with a careful consideration that reminds her, somehow, of the way Gareth is with her sometimes. 

Once the match starts, though, he ignores her and focuses intently on the action. She picks out Gareth early on playing, it seems, toward the back in front of the keeper. She doesn’t try to follow the game, not really - she watches Gareth instead. Brighton go one up in the dying stages of the half. The roar in the ground is deafening. She gets swept up onto her feet with the rest of the crowd. She gets shoved a bit off balance but Mr. Barry steadies her. “Thank you,” she says, though she’s sure he can’t hear her over the crowd. 

She’s certain halftime’s going to be a repeat of the ride to the ground. Mr. Barry surprises her by turning to her and saying, “Football is very important to Gareth, very important _for_ Gareth. He can’t afford to be distracted.” 

She doesn’t get it, not at first; when she does, she’s not sure what to say. “Mr. Barry,” she begins, “I, uh, I understand how much football means to him, really I do. I understand how hard he works at it and I’d never get in the way of that.”

Mr. Barry stares hard at her and then he says, “He may never make it, you understand, this might be as good as it gets. No big clubs calling, no big contracts, no money or fame or anything like that, nothing beyond this. So if--”

She cuts him off. She’s almost too mad to speak, but she manages, “I don’t care about that or football. Just him. I don’t care if it’s just this, I mean, I want him to, you know, to make it, because it’d make him happy, I know it would, but I don’t care if it’s just this. I wouldn’t care if there wasn’t this, I just--”

“Okay,” Mr. Barry says, his tone suddenly gentle, “Okay, Louise, all right. I’m sorry. I just--”

“I understand,” she says. She does, even if it still makes her mad.

He nods. “Okay. So,” he says, settling back into his seat, “know much about football?”

“No. Nothing, really.” 

“Gareth doesn’t talk about it?” He sounds surprised. 

“No. We, ah, we don’t really talk about it, you know?”

“Well, I could explain a bit, if you like?”

She takes it for the peace offering she’s fairly certain it is and says, “I’d like that.” 

He spends the second half explaining this call and that call and the different things happening on the pitch. She keeps her eyes on Gareth and smiles and nods in the right places.

At the end of the game - Brighton win 1-0 - Mr. Barry says, “Would you like to go see Gareth?”

“Can we, I mean, is it allowed?”

“Sure,” he says. 

He leads her through the crowds in the same way he had when they’d come in. They wait for Gareth in a narrow, half-lit corridor. There are people all about coming and going. She presses as close as she can to the wall and tries to stay out of the way. 

When Gareth comes out, it takes him a moment to spot them. He lights up when he spots them. That’s for her, she thinks--hopes--his dad too, but also her. He comes straight for them--for her. He comes right to her and pulls her away from the wall into his arms. She should protest - his dad is right there - but she doesn’t, not when he’s wrapped around her, smiling like she’s the best thing he’s ever seen. “Lou! Lou! Hey.” She’s never seen him so amped up. “What’d you think?”

“It was--” She doesn’t know how to continue.

He laughs. “You hated it, didn’t you?”

She pats his chest. “No. No. I didn’t. I just--”

He smiles and leans in to whisper, “It’s okay if you did.”

“I didn’t. Didn’t really understand it but--but--” She ducks her head, a bit embarrassed. “I liked watching you.” 

He pulls her a bit closer, holds her a bit tighter. “Yeah?” He sounds like he does sometimes after they kiss. 

She pushes at him and says lowly, “Gareth, your dad, he’s--”

“Oh,” he says and lets her step back, “Right.”

His dad claps his shoulder and they have a conversation about the game she doesn’t bother to follow. Someone going past clips her hard enough that she goes stumbling back. Gareth catches her and turns her so she’s between him and the wall. “Oi,” he yells, “Watch it Matty, would you?” He runs his hands up and down her arms. “Lou? Lou, you all right? I mean, he didn’t-- You okay?” He’s so sweetly concerned, all about nothing at all.

She smiles. “M’fine Gareth, s’just a bit of a bump, yeah?”

He frowns. “He should watch where he’s going.”

She laughs a little. “Maybe I should watch where I am.” 

He’s still frowning. “He--”

“Gareth,” she says, pushing at his chest, “It’s fine.”

“All right, son,” Mr. Barry says, “I’ve got to get her back.”

“Okay,” Gareth says.” He steals a kiss before she can protest. “See you, ‘kay, Lou?”

“Yeah.” She’s sure she’s bright red. Kissing her in front of his dad, what was he thinking? “‘Course.”

She’s pretty sure she’s still blushing when Mr. Barry drops her off. “Thank you,” she manages to say, “For bringing me.” 

He smiles and says, seemingly sincerely, “Any time, Louise.”

***

She goes to more matches. More than a few, but not too many. She learns the offside rule. She doesn’t see what the fuss is all about, it’s not that difficult to understand. She finds out that losing makes Gareth quiet in a different way than he normally is. She’d known, of course, before, when he’d lost, but it’s different coming face to face with him right afterwards. She can never work out just what to say but if she touches him, hugs him, he’ll smile a bit for her. She learns when it’s okay to interrupt Mr. Barry and ask questions and when it’s not. Mr. Barry watches Gareth’s matches like they’re a matter of life and death. He goes, she finds out, to all of them, home and away. She can’t imagine that.

She doesn’t learn to love football, though, or even to like it. She never quite gets the knack of following the game instead of watching Gareth. She thinks, maybe, she starts to understand how much Gareth loves football, how much it totally consumes him. It worries her a bit, makes her wonder how she’ll ever be able to compete with such all consuming devotion. But then, when she’s with Gareth, when he looks at her, she feels like she’s the only thing he sees, like she’s his whole world. 

Mr. Barry, very offhandedly, invites her to supper after one of the games. After that, whenever she goes to a match, she has supper at the Barrys’. It’s nice. Mr. Barry is not nearly as stern and sober as he’d appeared when she first met him and she really does like Mrs. Barry. 

After supper, her and Gareth always end up in his room. It’s always tidier than she expects it to be. The walls are papered with pictures of players she doesn’t recognize. They’ll lie facing each other on his bed and kiss and kiss until she can’t bear it anymore. It’s there that she lets him unbutton her blouse for the first time and fumble open the clasp of her bra.

He looks at her with gratifying awe and that helps her over her initial embarrassment. They learn, together, the ways she likes to be touched. She’s never gone this far before. He’s sweet, for all his obvious eagerness, and he goes as slow as she wants him to. They don’t go terribly far, in truth, a bit of petting, a lot of kissing. Sometimes, when a game’s really shattered him, they don’t do any of it. They curl up together, instead, her head on his chest, his arm around her, and talk about all sorts of things. Everything but football.

***

Winter winds into spring and spring hurtles towards summer. She can’t wait for summer, for the end of football, so it’ll be like last summer, Gareth around all the time. Emma teases her, “You’re going to abandon me for that footballer of yours, aren’t you? Come the holidays.”

“No,” she says, “‘Course not, Em.”

Emma smiles, “Don’t even, Lou, you are.” She tips her head to the side and says, more seriously, “You really love him, huh, Lou?” 

Louise’s almost sure she does, but she hugs that close to her. She’s not ready to say it, to think it. “Oh, Em,” she says, “I dunno. Maybe.”

Emma gives her a look that says she doesn’t believe a word of it. 

The summer starts even more wonderfully than she’d imagined. Gareth takes her out for the anniversary of that day on the sidewalk when she’d laughed when he’d asked her out. She argues that they should really celebrate the day of their first proper date but he won’t have any of it. 

They have dinner, nowhere fancy, just like they might normally. He brings her flowers, pink roses, and, on the walk home, he says, “I, uh, I got you something.” He starts digging in his pockets.

“Oh, Gareth,” she says, “You didn’t, I mean, the flowers, dinner, you--”

He leans over and kisses her. “Wanted to.” He hands her a little, flat box. It’s wrapped clumsily enough that she knows he wrapped it. A bow’s stuck not quite in the center of the box. “Well,” he says, ducking his head, “Aren’t you...”

“Oh,” she says, “Now?” He nods. 

He doesn’t watch her unwrap it. Her dress doesn’t have pockets and she doesn’t know what to do with the paper. “Gareth, could you?” She holds out the paper. 

He takes it and shoves it in his pocket. “Open it,” he says. He ducks his head again but she knows he’s watching as she opens the box.

Inside is a small, open, silver heart of a delicate silver chain. It’s lovely. “Oh, _Gareth._ ” She can’t find the right of words so she puts the lid back back on and just flings herself at him.

He laughs as he catches her. “So,” he says, pulling her close, “You like it.”

She kisses him once, twice, a third time for good measure. “Are you-- I love it, Gareth. It’s beautiful.”

“Would you,” he says, smiling a bit, “I mean, could you put it on, I just-- I’d like to see it, you know, on you.” 

She steps back and impulsively hands him the box. “Help me with it.”

He fumbles the box. “Uh, right. Okay. Sure.” The necklace looks impossibly delicate in his hands. He steps closer. Usually, if they’re this close, they’re kissing. It’s strangely intimate to be so close, to stare at Gareth as he concentrates on fastening the chain around her neck. He gets tangled up in her hair on his first try. “Could you?” he says softly. She holds her hair up out of the way. His fingertips glance against her neck as he fastens the necklace. She shivers and wants desperately to run her tongue along the line of his pursed lips. “There,” he says, tracing the line of the chain with his finger. “Beautiful.” He taps the heart, which rests just below the dip of her collarbone. “It’s-- Lou, you’re--” He smiles a bit helplessly and she leans in to kiss him.

She imagines, in the days after that, that the summer will only get better. But, not a week later, he comes to see her looking so serious, and says, “We-- There’s something-- We should talk.” 

It feels like the end of last summer all over again. She barely manages to say, “Okay.”

“I, Lou, Aston Villa, they want to, I mean, they’re going to, they’re buying me, me and Michael both.”

She’s learned enough about football to know Villa play in the Premier League, that this is, potentially, a huge deal. “Gareth, really? That’s fantastic. Truly. Just--”

He smiles for a moment, big and uninhibited. “Yeah. It’s, yeah.” Then he sobers a bit. “I’ll have to go there, to Birmingham.”

“What? When?” She knew this, somewhere, that Villa wasn’t close enough for him to stay.

“Sometime in August, maybe end of July.” 

She steps back. “Oh. Well, I mean, suppose you’ve got to. Still, it’s good, right Gareth? Villa, that’s--” 

He smiles. “Yeah. It is. I don’t--” He sounds nervous. “I don’t want anything to change, you know, with us. It’ll be hard, I know, but Lou, I-- Say something. Please.” 

She fiddles with the heart around her throat. “No, of course, Gareth, of course nothing will change.” It’s partly a lie, she knows it, but, even though things _will_ change, she means the basic truth of it, that she wants to stay with him. “We’ll,” she continues, “We’ll work it out. You’ll see.”

He smiles. “Yeah?” 

“Yeah,” she says, scared that they won’t, scared that he’ll go off and forget all about her. 

A week or so later, she sleeps with him for the first time. Her mum is off shopping with her aunt and her dad’s at work. They start with the things they’ve done before and then, before they go further, he asks her, “Are you sure?” so many times she has to tell him to stop asking. 

It’s over faster than she thought it’d be and it’s not really all that exciting. It’s kind of uncomfortable and, when it’s over, she just feels sweaty and sticky and kind of sore. Gareth’s too heavy on top of her and she wants to push and push until he moves. “Gareth,” she says.

He pushes up a bit. “Lou?” He looks so happy. She’d made him that happy, put that look on his face. It’s nice to know that. He kisses her a bit clumsily and says, “Are you, was it, I mean--”

“It was--” She stops. “Was-- Can you move a bit? Maybe. You’re--” 

“Oh.” He looks a little panicked. “Right.”

She feels funny, being naked with him without him touching her, so she pulls the sheets up around her. “Lou? He sounds worried. “Are you, uh, are you okay?”

“Yeah,” she says, trying for a smile.

He lies down next to her and tentatively curls his arm around her. “Guess it wasn’t so, I mean, for you?”

She buries her face in his neck. “It wasn’t-- I mean, it was okay.” 

He pulls her closer. “We’ll figure it out,” he says, “I’ll-- Next time, I mean, if you want to, It’ll be better.” 

She burrows closer, the sheet slips a bit, but now she finds she doesn’t mind so much. “Yeah,” she says, because in spite of this, she does want to, she wants everything with him.

“Next time.” He kisses the side of her head. “You’ll see, Lou, we’ll figure it out.”

She tells Emma about it because, years ago, they’d made a promise to tell each other about their first times. Emma gives her a look and, instead of asking one of the questions she’s expecting, says, “Lou, are you sure that was the best idea? He’s leaving.”

“He’s not leaving me,” she says, wrapping her hand around her necklace and pulling until it digs into her skin.

Emma gives her a look that might be pity and says, “I hope not.”

It does get better, maybe not the second time, but they slowly figure it out. Gareth applies a ferocious determination to the task, the likes of which she’s only seen him display on the football pitch. The first time they make it good for her, he grins at her, after, looks even happier than he had after the first time. She grins back because it’s all a bit brilliant. No wonder people make such a fuss. It’s still a bit hit or miss, but it’s definitely better. 

They pass what they have left of the summer that way, always together, always touching, so entangled with each other that sometimes she’s not sure where she stops and he begins. 

She feels like she’s hoarding all these moments away for when he’s gone. She knows there are other things she should be worrying about, other things she should be thinking about. Her GCSE results will be coming any day now and she’ll be going to college for sixth form soon. But, with Gareth, she doesn’t talk about any of that, doesn’t think about it. He’s not thinking of it, doesn’t have to worry about it, doesn’t have to worry about anything but football. So she focuses on Gareth, on getting all the time she can with him before he leaves. Somehow, that seems more important than anything else. 

When she says goodbye to him, he hugs her so tightly she can hardly breathe and whispers in her ear, “I’ll call and--and you don’t have to worry Lou-- Lou I--I love you. I--”

If he weren’t holding her, she thinks she might’ve fallen over. “I love you,” she says, pushing her face against his shoulder, “Gareth. Me too. I love you,” and he hugs her even tighter.

***

The past year, as difficult as it had seemed, hadn’t prepared her for Gareth being away. He’s reduced to a voice on the other end of the phone. They talk about visits but they can’t figure out when or how. She misses him but she tells herself that she has a life that doesn’t revolve around Gareth Barry and she’s going to live it.

It works some of the time and sometimes, when she thinks about how long it’s been since she’s seen him, it doesn’t. 

Neither Emma nor her mum really approve. Emma points out fit blokes and insists that Robbie in their English class quite fancies her and she should consider other options. Her mum is quieter about her disapproval but she’ll make comments about how long she spends on the phone with Gareth or make vague comments about how they could still be friends but is she sure she really wants to wait around for him. 

Louise ignores them both. She tells Gareth a bit of it but he reacts badly to it and she stops telling him. Instead, they talk about other things, about football more than anything else. They’ve never talked about it so much but, now, it’s all Gareth _will_ talk about. She asks him about Birmingham, about how he’s finding it, about how he’s getting on with the family he and Michael are staying with, but he won’t talk about any of it. He gets clipped and distant and, more than once, tells her _just leave it, Lou._

She tries telling him about about college and about what’s going on in the neighborhood, hoping he’ll at least talk to her about those things but, for the first time since they’ve been together, she starts to feel like he isn’t listening when she talks. Their conversations get shorter and shorter. He always tells her, though, that he misses her, and ends every call by saying he loves her. She holds onto that, as fall slides messily into winter, and pretends she doesn’t feel like he’s slipping further and further away from her. 

In November, it gets worse. She can’t remember when they had a conversation longer than half an hour. She hasn’t seen him since August. His parents go to visit him but not the other way around. He says she can go with them but her parents won’t allow it. She aches to see him, to touch him, to reassure herself that she didn’t imagine the previous year, that they still have a real, solid relationship. 

She goes out more with Emma, looking for a distraction. They see Robbie out somewhere and she smiles at him and flirts a bit. He’s into it, Emma’s right, she thinks, just like she was about Gareth, he does fancy her. He asks her out a week or so later, catches her right after class. She turns him down, explains she has a boyfriend. He takes it well enough.

She tells Gareth about it. His jealousy isn’t as gratifying as she thought it would be. It just grates somehow, reminds her that, if he were _here_ , people would know about them, would see them together. 

At the beginning of December, everything shatters apart. He doesn’t call for three straight days and, when she calls him, no one answers. When he does call, she’s unable to stop herself from snapping, “It’s about time. Gareth, you can’t do that, can’t just--”

“Can’t what?” He interrupts, clipped and terse, “Lou, huh?”

“Just not call like that.”

“I’m calling, now, aren’t I? And you could call, Lou, you know? Why do I--”

“I _did_ ,” she interrupts, “Where were you, huh, Gareth?”

“Where do you think, Lou?” he says, “There’s things I’ve got to do, I can’t just--”

“Can’t just what?” she says. She’s afraid of the answer so instead of waiting for it she just keeps going. “Can’t remember to call me, can’t take a moment, just a moment, to talk to me?”

“I’ve training, you know that, and--”

“And what?” she says, “That takes all day? That takes _three days_? Gareth--” 

He cuts her off. “It’s more than that, you know that, Lou, I’ve--”

“No, I don’t,” she says, “I don’t know that, Gareth, because you won’t _tell_ me. You don’t tell me anything, it’s all football and--and now, you’re not calling, and that’s football too. Football all the time, Gareth, for everything, I--I--” She can’t keep going, has to press her eyes closed tight so she doesn’t do anything ridiculous, like start to cry. 

She wants reassurance, wants to know she’s still part of his life, that she hasn’t gotten lost amidst the ever increasing demands football makes on him. Instead she gets, “Football’s what I do, Lou, it’s-- This is my _future_ , Lou, I can’t-- Training, games, all that stuff. I can’t just blow it off, I’ve got to--”

And she wants to scream because she’s not asking him to, she’s really not, she just wants him to remember her, to make some time for her, to talk to her like he used to. “And what am I, Gareth?” she says, fast and sharp, so she doesn’t give in and cry, “Am I just-- What about me? Us? What’s that? Is that nothing, is it-- _Gareth_.” He’s quiet, so quiet, and his silence feels an awful lot like an answer, so she says, “All right, then, suppose that answers that.”

“No, Lou,” he says, too slow and too hollow for her liking, “that’s not-- I--” 

“You what?” she says and hopes - prays - he’ll give her something real, something to hold on to.

“I--” he says, “Lou, I--” 

“I can’t,” she says, “I can’t do this Gareth, I-- I need-- I can’t--” She’s crying now, feels hot and cold and shivery all over, like she’s flying apart. “I can’t, Gareth,” she says and her own words sound so far away, like someone else is saying them, “I’m sorry. I thought I could, but if you-- If football is so-- Maybe it’s better, if we--we just-- I’m sorry.”

“ _Lou_ ,” he says and he sounds desperate but it feels like too little, too late. “Please, _Lou_ , don’t--”

“No,” she says, “I’m sorry,” and she hangs up the phone. It’s over, she thinks, just like that. 

She sits there by the phone until her mum comes and pulls her away. She sits her down on the sofa and lets her cry. She doesn’t anything, doesn’t say _I told you so_ , she just holds her until she’s done crying and then makes her a cup of tea. 

When she tells Emma, she does say _I told you so_ but not meanly and she hugs her tight and doesn’t make fun when she starts to cry again. 

Once she’s done with crying, she tries to start again. She tells herself it doesn’t matter, that he obviously didn’t need her, didn’t want her. She doesn’t need him either, she tells herself, doesn’t miss him. She does, though, sometimes quite desperately. 

She lets Emma drag her around, though, tries her best to have fun, tries to remember to smile. 

Robbie catches her one day after History and says, “I, uh, I heard that you, that-- That you broke up with your boyfriend and I-- Well, m’sorry and, well, yeah, just, m’sorry.” 

She tries to smile at him. She’s quite certain he’s not at all sorry. “Thanks, I guess,” she says and thinks she’s going to kill Emma. 

After school, she corners Emma and says, “What’s Robbie doing coming up to me, saying he knows I broke up with Gareth and that he’s _sorry_? God, Em, what’d you tell him?”

Emma looks guilty, which, Louise thinks, she bloody well should. “I,” Emma says, “I just, Lou, I wanted to help, to--”

“How’s Robbie Neal being sorry gonna help, Em? God, he’s not sorry, anyway, is he? Just-- How’s it supposed to help, Em?”

Emma shrugs. “I just thought, maybe, it’d make you see that there’s other blokes out there, that Gareth isn’t--”

“Isn’t what?”

Emma tips her chin up and says, “Isn’t your only option, that you--that you could, you know...”

“Oh, Em,” she says, tired all of the sudden, tired of missing Gareth, tired of trying to be mad at Emma, “I just...”

Emma hugs her tight. “I know, Lou, I know.” She sets her back and adds, “But, maybe, if Robbie wanted to, you know, to ask you out, maybe it wouldn’t be the end of the world, if you said yes.”

“Maybe not," Louise says and wishes she could believe it.

He does ask her out, a couple of days later, and she says yes. It’s a disaster. They go get something to eat together, one day after school. He spends the whole time going on and on about football. He’s a Brighton fan, which, well, wouldn’t that just be her luck? It could be worse, she supposes, he could be a Villa fan. She doesn’t even bother trying to get a word in edgewise, she knows they’ll never be doing this again, there’s no point. She knows Emma’s right, that there are other blokes out there besides Gareth, that she’ll find someone else, but it’s not going to be Robbie bloody Neal, who apparently thinks she cares about every little detail of Brighton’s last three matches and assumes, that, because she’s a girl, she doesn’t understand the offside rule. He insists on walking her home but, when he leans in to kiss her, she turns her face away, mumbles a goodbye, and goes straight inside.

He leaves her well alone after that and she’s glad. Emma’s philosophical about the whole thing and says, “Guess if was just too soon, yeah?” 

Louise shrugs. “Sure. Whatever.” Emma doesn’t bring it up again.

The rest of December passes in a blur. Once, out shopping with her mum, they meet Mrs. Barry. They have an awkward, awful, stilted conversation. She forces herself not to ask her about Gareth. 

She can’t bring herself to take off his necklace, no matter how her mum frets and Emma frowns. She tells herself everyday she’ll take it off and everyday she doesn’t. The holidays come and she’s still wearing it. 

On Christmas morning, early, they’re still eating breakfast, the bell rings. Her mum huffs a bit and puts down her tea. “Lou, love, would you mind?” As she gets up her mum mutters, “I hope it isn’t Lena. I told her after eleven.” Her Aunt Lena is always early and it drives her mum mad. 

It’s not Aunt Lena, though, it’s Gareth. She closes her eyes, because he can’t be there, can’t just be standing there at the bottom of the steps. She opens her eyes. He’s still there. She feels dizzy, like the whole world’s shifting under her feet. Her first instinct on seeing him there is, despite everything, to just throw herself into his arms. Of course, she doesn’t, instead, she steps outside and lets the door shut behind her. She’s still in her pajamas and she shivers a bit in the cold morning air. “Gareth,” she says. Her voice is a vague, unsubstantial thing. “Gareth,” she says again, forcing steel into her voice, “What? Why are you--”

He comes up the steps. He stops on the last step, doesn’t come up onto the stoop. “Lou. Louise, I, well, I--”

“What?” she snaps, impatient with his usual stuttering. His face falls a bit. “What,” she says more gently, “Gareth?”

He comes up onto the stoop. He’s not an arm’s length away. Her heart is hammering in her chest. She barely feels the cold. She wants to reach out and touch him. He looks just the same, a bit broader, maybe, but his face is exactly the same. “I,” he says, “I just, _God_ , Lou, I miss you so much. I love you and--and-- I just, I miss you.” She’d imagined something like this more times than she wants to admit. “I know,” he continues, sounding increasingly desperate, “that I-- I made you think that-- That you weren’t important, that football was-- I’m sorry, Lou, so _sorry_ , and--and you-- You are important, so important, and I’ve missed you like mad, I-- Lou-- Lou, _please_ , say something.”

She doesn’t know where to start. “I,” she manages, “I’m sorry too. I should, well, I should have said something, shouldn’t’ve just, you know-- I--” 

“No,” he says, “Don’t say sorry. It--it was me, I--”

It’s tempting to just let him take all the blame but she can’t. “It was both of us, Gareth, we--we just didn’t know how hard it would, be, you being there, me being here, and we--we just--”

“Yeah,” he says, slumping a bit, “It was--was bad, wasn’t it? And I--I was just--I missed you and home and I didn’t--” He scrubs his hand through his hair. “Didn’t know how to, didn’t know what to do, and football, I-- At least I understood that, could, you know, but, God, _Lou_ , I missed you, so much, missed just hearing your voice. And--” 

“Oh, _Gareth_ ,” she says, “I--I missed you too, so much, I--” She can’t keep going. She’s sure she’ll cry if she keeps going and she can’t, not in front of him, not until she knows why he’s here on her stoop, saying all the things she wished he’d said that day on the phone.

“Would you,” he says, “I mean, is there anyone else? Could we, would you-- Lou, I love you, all I want is-- _Please._ ” 

She thinks, for a second, about Robbie. She decides he definitely doesn’t count. She shakes her head. “No. There’s no one. I--” He’s looking at her with such desperate hope and, suddenly, words don’t seem enough so she finally gives in and throws herself at him. He catches her and pulls her close and she feels like she never left his arms. She presses her face into his shoulder. He smells like pine and cedar and the clear sharpness of the winter cold. 

“Lou,” he says with wondering disbelief, “God, Lou,” and she starts to cry. She thought, she _swore_ , she was done with tears but, now, she can’t stop. “Don’t,” he says, rubbing his hands up and down her back, “ _Please_ , Lou, don’t. We can-- It’ll be okay, Lou, please don’t.” She takes a deep, shuddering breath. It hurts, tears through her chest. She straightens up. He smiles tentatively. “All right?” She’s not, not really, but she feels better than she has in a long time. She nods. “So,” he says, “Was that, I mean, are we--are we back together?” 

She wants to just say yes and kiss his beautiful, hopeful smile. “I want that,” she says, “but Gareth, we, these last few months, I can’t, not like that, not again. If we do, we-- We have to do better because, I can’t, Gareth, it--it drove me mad. 

He nods. “Yeah.” He looks away. “I, yeah, it was bad, wasn’t it?” He looks back. “We--we can do better, though, right? I--I want to try, if--if you do?”

“I do,” she says, “Oh, Gareth, I missed you, so much-- I--” She’s crying again, stupid, traitorous tears, hot against her cheeks. 

He cups her face with his hands and clumsily wipes them way. “Lou, _Lou_ , I--” 

She turns her face into his palm. “I love you,” she says. He leans in and kisses her. It’s soft and chaste and over far too soon for her liking. 

“You, ah,” he says, looking down, “You’re still wearing it.” 

She reaches up to touch the heart around her throat. “I--I couldn’t bring myself to, you know--” He dips his head and presses a kiss to the heart. His lips are warm and bit chapped. It should be awkward and a bit silly but her heart stutters and skips in her chest and she can hardly breathe. “Gareth,” she says helplessly, “ _Gareth._ ” 

When he lifts his head, he’s frowning a bit. “What?”

“You’re freezing, Lou, you’ve got to get inside.”

“Only,” she says, “if you come too.” 

He smiles. “Can I?”

“Come inside,” she says.

They spend every minute they can together before he leaves again. They actually talk about how to make the distance easier to bear. They’ve never done that before. They plan a visit for her. More importantly, they convince her parents to let her go (Mrs. Barry helps them out with that). She feels better about saying goodbye than she had that day in early August. Now all there is, is to see if it will actually work, if they’ll hold together or crumble apart again.

***

It’s still not easy, being apart, but she’s sure it never could be. It is better, though, in just about every way, than it was before. There are some ups and downs but they find a rhythm, a pattern, that works for them.

She visits. She’s even there when he makes his first team debut. She can barely watch him step onto the pitch she’s so nervous for him. She doesn’t relax until he kicks the ball for the first time and nothing horrible happens as a result. She’s there with his parents. She and Mrs. Barry watch Gareth while Mr. Barry stares intensely at the action. When the final whistle blows, Mr. Barry slumps back in his seat and says, “Okay. That’s all right then,” and she knows that he’s intensely and completely proud of Gareth. She is as well. 

Gareth makes two more appearances for the first team before the end of the season but she doesn’t see either of them. It’s fine. She still doesn’t really enjoy football and, if she’s going to see Gareth, she’d much rather not share him with football. She does enough of that all ready. 

Then the season’s over and he’s back home. 

They pass the summer like the previous two. She asks him, one rare, sunny afternoon, if he doesn’t wish they could go away or do something more exciting. “Nah,” he says, giving her a casual, off-center kiss, “I’ve got you, my mates, what else could I want?” 

She rolls her eyes, pokes him and says, “Good job you mentioned me before your mates.”

He smiles that sweet smile of his that’s so incongruous with the blunt, ruggedness of the rest of him. “Always you first.” He slings his arm around her shoulders and says, “You wait, Lou, someday I’ll take you wherever you want to go.” 

She both loves it and hates it when he talks that way. She likes his confidence in his playing, in his future, but she always remembers Mr. Barry at that first game she watched, remembers his warning about how temporary it all can be. She wants Gareth either way, but she’s afraid he doesn’t want himself either way, that he can only see one future. “Maybe,” she says, nestling against his side, “I’ll take myself everywhere I want to go.”

“Okay,” he says easily, “Can I come too?”

“Sure,” she says, “Why not?”

Before he leaves for pre-season, he buys her a mobile phone. “You don’t,” she says, when he presents it to her, “really, Gareth.” 

He pushes it into her hand. “Take it. We’ll be able to talk more. I-- Please, Lou, think of how happy your mum will be that you aren’t taking up the phone all the time.” 

She knows full well that happy is the last thing this will make her mum. “Okay,” she says, “All right.” 

He smiles. “You’ll see, Lou, you’ll be glad you have it.”

It’s not any easier saying goodbye this time but she doesn’t cling the way she had last time. She feels secure in a way she hadn’t then. 

She’s right about her mum’s reaction to the phone. The first time she sees it, she says, “Where’d that come from, then?” 

She braces herself and says, “Gareth got it for me.” 

Her mum raises her eyebrows and says, “S’expect he’s paying the bill as well?” She nods. “You tell him, Louise, that you’ll pay the bill yourself.”

“Mum--”

Her mum raises her hand. “No, Louise, I want you to make your own way, not--”

She, probably unwisely, interrupts, “Mum, I am, I will, it’s just a gift. That’s all.” 

Her mum sighs. “Louise, love, I don’t--”

“What, Mum?”

Her mum’s expression’s hardens. “I don’t want you tying everything up with that boy. Don’t want you thinking that’s the only future you have.”

“Mum, it’s not, I mean, it’s not like that--” 

Her mum interrupts, “I want you to have something, a future, that’s yours, something that can’t be taken away from you if--”

She stops. Louise knows the end of the sentence, though; if Gareth gets tired of her, if he meets some flash girl and leaves her flat. She starts to say he wouldn’t but she remembers December and doesn’t say it. “Mum,” she says, “I--I’ll have that, really, I will. With Gareth or--” She stops. It hurts to say the next bit but she says it anyway. “or without him. It’s just a phone, it’s not--”

Her mum pats her arm. “Then, Louise, you tell him that you’ll pay the bill.”

“Okay,” she says, “I’ll talk to him about it.”

Her mum smiles. “Good girl. Now, how about some tea?” She lets her mum make tea and tell her all the latest gossip from Aunt Lena.

When she tells Gareth she wants to pay the bill, he gets, well not mad exactly, but close. “Lou, what? Of course you won’t. I’ve got it.”

“Gareth.” She doesn’t want to tell him about the conversation she had with her mum. “It’s not, I can--”

He interrupts. “No. It was-- I’ve got it.”

“My mum, she--she wants me to. Can you just--just let me?”

“Your mum? What’s she got to do with it?”

“Gareth, it doesn’t matter, just let me pay, okay?”

“Lou--” She can tell he wants to be stubborn about it but she’s not up for the row if she tells him what else her mum said.

“Please, Gareth, can you just let it go?”

“Fine,” he says, after a minute, “I just-- I wanted to do that for you, want to-- I want to give you everything you want, Lou, everything.” He’s so unabashedly sincere and part of her wants to just let him, wants to give him everything she has in return. 

She thinks of her mum’s words and says carefully, “Can get myself the things I want.”

“Yeah,” he says, “I know, I just--”

“I know,” she says, “I know.”

The next time she sees him, he gives her a bracelet. It matches the necklace, two, delicate interlocking silver hearts on a silver chain. “Gareth,” she says, when he takes her wrist and fastens if on, “You shouldn’t’ve.” 

He lifts her hand and kisses the inside of her wrist. “Wanted to.”

“It’s lovely,” she says, not knowing what else to say, “Thank you.”

He kisses her. “This season, Lou, it’s going to be so good. They’re saying I’m going to be playing regularly and, this is it, Lou, everything’s going to be good from here. You’ll see.” 

She thinks everything’s already pretty good. She kisses him. “I’m glad you’ll get to play.”

He does play regularly, almost every game. She takes to glancing at the sports pages to keep track of whether he wins or loses. She doesn’t watch the games though, not on telly or when she goes to visit him. 

She’s busy with school, with trying to figure out what she’s going to do next year. Her parents, especially her mum, are pushing for her to go to university. She’s not sure if she wants to. 

Emma declares often and in dramatic fashion, to anyone who’ll listen, that there’s no way she’s going. “Enough,” she says, “No more. I’ve had it with school and exams and being bored out of my bloody skull.” 

Louise’s not sure university would be so bad. She doesn’t mind school, not really, she’s even a fairly good student. There’s ages of time to decide though, so she endures her mum’s hints and ignores Emma when she tries to wind her up by saying, “Of course, Lou, you don’t have to worry, Gareth’ll make sure you’ll never want for anything, won’t he? Playing for the first team now and all.” She knows, though she never says it, barely thinks it, that Emma, though she’s really just having a go, is basically right. Gareth, she’s almost sure, thinks that way, thinks of her as his to take care of. 

In early November, out running an errand for her mum, she runs into Mrs. Barry. “Louise,” she says, smiling, “How lovely to see you. It’s been awhile.” 

“Hello, Mrs. Barry.” 

Mrs. Barry settles her shopping basket on her hip. “How are you, love? Gareth says you’re busy with school and all.” 

She flushes a bit, thinking of Gareth talking about her with his mum. “Yes. It’s, well, it’s not so bad. Lots of work though.”

Mrs. Barry smiles. “I remember. It’s your last year, isn’t it?”

“Yes. I--” Someone reaches in between them to pick out potatoes. 

Mrs. Barry comes to her side and touches her arm. “It’s no good, trying to talk here. Would you like to come round for tea one day?”

“I, uh--” The woman searching through the potatoes gives her a nasty look and she shifts out of the way. “Sure, Mrs. Barry. That’d be nice.”

“Wonderful. How about Thursday, around 4:30?”

“Okay. I’ll, uh, I’ll see you then,” she says and flees.

She calls Gareth as soon as she gets home. “Your mum,” she says, without saying hello, “She invited me to tea. Gareth, what’s your mum doing inviting me to tea?”

He laughs and she wishes he was stood in front of her so she could smack him. “Gareth.”

“Dunno, Lou. She likes you, though, so, you know, it’ll be all right.”

“Really?”

“‘Course she does.” He pauses. “Ah, you like her too, right?”

“Yes,” she says, “She’s lovely, your mum.”

“So,” he says with infuriating calm, “What’s the problem?”

“Oh, shut it,” she says, “Why do I tell you these things anyway?”

“Dunno,” he says and she can just imagine the smile he has on his face and she finds herself wanting to smack him again.

“If you were here,” she says, “I’d smack that stupid smirk right off your face.”

“Aw, Lou, I wasn’t--”

“Liar,” she snaps.

For all that (and the minor panic she has waiting on the Barrys’ stoop after she’d rung the bell), tea goes fine. They chat and Mrs. Barry feeds her very nice cake. “I’m glad,” Mrs. Barry says, just as Louise’s finishing her second cup of tea, “That he has you.”

She almost chokes on her tea. “I, um, thank you?”

Mrs. Barry pats her hand. “I thought, for the longest time, that he’d never focus on anything but football. It’s fine, football, and it’s given him so much, but he was so focused, so-- And, of course, his father didn’t help with that, but then he met you and-- Well, I’m just glad. There should be more to life then football, more important things than football, shouldn’t there?”

Louise’s reeling a bit. She sets down her teacup. “I, uh, yes, ‘course, there should be.” She’s not sure what else to say.

Mrs. Barry smiles. “I’d like it very much if you’d come back again for tea.”

“Okay,” Louise says, “I, sure.”

When Gareth calls her that night, the first thing he says is, “Well, how was it?”

“Very nice,” she says.

“What did you talk about?”

“None of your business.”

“Aw, Lou, c’mon. Was it about me?”

“No,” she says, “Not really.” She figures it’s only a bit of a lie. 

“Huh,” he says before moving on and telling her all about the latest stupid thing Michael’s done. 

She doesn’t get to go back to see Mrs. Barry, though, not then. She spends November and early December trying to decide about university. Gareth’s no help. He just tells her to do what she wants. She knows the idea of university is utterly foreign to him, much as football is to her. She finds herself envying the way he has football, the way he’d gotten the future he’d wanted most at just sixteen.

He says, once, very casually, “You can, if you want, you could come here. We--” 

She cuts him off. “No, Gareth, I, my mum she’d-- I--I just, I couldn’t.” She can’t think about that as a possibility. He doesn’t bring it up again.

Her mum’s view hasn’t changed. She’s convinced university is the right course for her. Emma’s no help at all. She just shrugs and says, “Dunno, Lou. Do what you want.”

She’s sitting at the kitchen table, one Saturday, with her father, applications and prospectuses spread all about. She’s this close to tearing her hair out, too overwhelmed by all the choices, by her own aimless, disjointed desires for the future, to do anything but stare blankly at them. Then her father says, in that quiet way he has, “Louise, sweetheart, just put that all away for a moment.”

She looks at him. “I can’t-- I have to-- I--” 

“Nonsense,” he says and shoves some of the stuff off the table onto the floor, “Just put it all aside for a bit.” He pushes some more and it flutters to the floor. “Go on.”

She pushes the rest onto the floor. It’s very satisfying. She starts to laugh, just giggle, and her dad starts too. “There,” he says, “Now then, tell me, Louise, what do you want, really? If it’s just to be with that bloke of yours, well, so be it. I’ll make it right with your mum.” 

He likes Gareth, she knows, approves of the way he treats her. He doesn’t worry about their relationship, not the way her mum does. As far as he’s concerned, her and Gareth are some sort of done deal. They’re not though, not really. She’s not sure she wants to sit around and wait for the day they really are, to _assume_ that day is coming in the future. “I think,” she says slowly, “I think I do want to go--to university, you know, I think, I might like it.” 

Her dad smiles. “Well, then, guess we best pick these up and try and figure out where you’d like to apply.” 

So they do. She’d already mostly settled on hospitality management as her course of study and, with her dad’s help, she narrows down the places she wants to send in applications for. She could, she knows, apply to places near Gareth and basically have both options, but she doesn’t. She looks instead at the Universities of Gloucestershire and Bournemouth and at other places that aren’t too far from home but aren’t that near Gareth either. She’s comfortable, now, with the distance of their relationship. She still misses him, of course, but they have a pattern that works for them. In the future, she thinks, she’d like something different, something _more_ , but not right now. 

Of the places she decides to apply, she thinks she likes the University of Gloucestershire best but she’s not overly enthused about any of them. Still, with her decision made, her applications submitted, everything seems easier, more settled. The rest of the year falls into a routine. She visits Gareth, has tea occasionally with his mum, goes to school, goes out with Emma and the rest of her mates. It’s nice. Familiar.

***

During the summer, Gareth announces that he’s getting his own place. Not at home, of course, but near the club. He asks her to come help him find a place. He has a realtor, provided by the club, she thinks, she’s very posh and wears suits that cost more, Louise’s sure, than half her clothes combined. She feels a little intimidated and horridly underdressed every time they see her. Her name is Anna and she’s decidedly deferential with Louise, which just intimidates her more.

She has a thankless task, though, Anna, because Gareth is hopeless about looking at places. He keeps asking Louise what she thinks but won’t offer his opinion about anything. Whenever Anna asks him anything, he just says, “Dunno. Ask Lou.” Even when she just asks him if he likes a place he only shrugs and says, “Dunno, guess it’s all right.”

After three days of this and no progress, Louise responds to his next _dunno ask Lou_ by saying to Anna, “Would you just excuse us a minute?” and dragging him outside. “Gareth Barry,” she says, “What’s all this? You’re driving that poor woman crazy.” 

He has the grace to duck his head and look a bit ashamed. “I, uh, I dunno, just, can’t you pick?” 

She puts her hands on her hips. “I won’t be living there, Gareth, you will. All you have to do is answer her questions and she’ll find you somewhere nice.” 

He reaches out and puts his hands over hers on her hips. He tumbles her forward into him. “What if,” he says, “what if you did, you know, live there?” 

She flattens her hands against his chest. “Gareth.”

“What’ya say, Lou, come live with me?”

“Gareth,” she sighs, plucking at his shirt collar, “I’m going to uni. You know that.” 

He shrugs. “So go to uni here, or just don’t go, come here and--”

She pokes him. “Come here and do what? What would I do while you--”

He pulls her closer. “I dunno, Lou, we’d figure it out and we’d be together, that--that’d be good, wouldn’t it?” He sounds sulky, a bit short. He gets that way sometimes when he doesn’t get his way straight away. She thinks, sometimes, that she’s grown up a bit and Gareth hasn’t; except, of course, when it comes to football. 

“Yes,” she says, patting his chest, “That’d be good, but, Gareth, I’m going to uni. We talked about this. You can’t--can’t just, out of the blue, say you want something else.” 

He sighs and looks terribly put upon. “I know, guess, I just, dunno. I want you with me, always, you know? Don’t like being without you.”

“I don’t like it either, but--” She tips up and kisses him to take the edge off of what she’ll say next. “For now, this is the way it’s going to be.”

“Okay,” he says, kissing her, “If that’s how you want it.”

She pushes at his chest. “Now, you’re going to go back up there and cooperate with Anna and find somewhere to live.” 

He smiles. “Yes, ma’am.” 

She smacks his shoulder. “Shut it.” She takes his hand. “C’mon.”

By the end of the afternoon, they’ve found him somewhere. When they say goodbye to Anna, she gives Louise an almost pathetically grateful look. 

“Suppose,” Gareth says, over dinner, “I’ll need, you know, furniture and the like.” He looks hopefully at her. 

She steals one of his chips and says, “Absolutely not.”

He pouts and steals her last bite of chicken. She decides to let him get away with it just this once. 

She stays with him for his first night in his new place. She refrains from commenting on the fact that he appears to think furniture means a bed, a dresser, a sofa, a television and little else. In fairness, it’s really a very nice bed, and she’s pretty sure you could get a fair few people on the sofa. 

In the morning, when she wakes up, she finds him propped up on his elbow, staring down at her. She stretches. His gaze slips down to her breasts and she hides a smile. “Gareth Barry,” she says, “Have you just been lying there watching me sleep?” 

He smiles and says a bit sheepishly, “Well, kinda.”

She settles back against the pillows and says, “That’s a bit creepy, that is.”

He reaches out and traces his finger along the line of her necklace. “Just like to look at you, here, in my bed.”

She smiles. “Well, it’s a very nice place to be.”

“You could,” he starts to say. 

“Don’t,” she says, “I’m not having that discussion again.”

He looks like he wants to argue but he says, “All right, Lou, fair enough.” She shifts closer and curls around him. “Suppose,” he says, “we should get up. Have breakfast or something.” 

She lifts up and kisses him. “Nah,” she says, “Let’s stay here.” He doesn’t argue.

***

She starts university and she hates it. Well, at first, she tells herself she’s adjusting, that she’ll get used to it and everything will be fine. But it doesn’t happen.

She tries.

Her courses aren’t the problem. For the most part, she likes them well enough. She doesn’t relate to her classmates, though; they all seem to have a plan, a goal for their lives. They all seem to know what they want to be, _who_ they want to be. She wishes she had that kind of certainty. 

She misses everything; her parents, Emma, the neighborhood, even Mrs. Barry. Of course, she misses Gareth too, but she’s used to missing him. It feels different, though, missing him here. At home, when she misses him, she can go see Mrs. Barry or sulk until Emma takes her out and makes her laugh. 

She meets some nice people, like her flatmates, who she likes well enough. She tells them, as they’re all getting to know each other, that _yes she has a boyfriend_ , but, when they ask about him, she’s not sure what to say. She tentatively tells them that he plays football. They gape a bit but they seem to believe her. 

They must tell people, because she gets some attention for it, gets asked about it. She doesn’t like it. At home, loads of people know about her and Gareth, know he plays, and no one ever makes a fuss. To most of them, Gareth’s just the Barry boy or Gareth from school. This kind of attention is new and, mostly, it makes her uncomfortable. 

She keeps waiting for it to get better, this desperate, clawing wrongness that’s settled in her chest. It’s half homesickness and half something she can’t quite figure out. 

It doesn’t get better. 

She throws herself into her courses, tries to make new friends, goes out with her flatmates. They always tease her about the way she reacts to attention from blokes. “Lou,” they’ll say, ”You act like you’re already wearing a wedding ring.” She always finds herself tugging at her necklace and feeling like, maybe, they’re right. She likes it, though, doesn’t see the problem.

She keeps at it for awhile, keeps trying, but, mostly, it keeps making her feel worse. She starts going home or to see Gareth as often as she can. Then she stops going home because, even though she misses Emma, she can’t bear putting on a happy face for her mum, who always wants to know how it’s going, who’s so proud that she’s at university. It’s so much easier with Gareth who’s always happy to see her and doesn’t really ask questions. 

He tends to treat university the way she treats football. He doesn’t ask about it, but he’ll listen when she talks about it. It’s comforting, seeing him, but it doesn’t ease the underlying sense that, by choosing university, she’s made a mistake. 

She perseveres through the semester because she’s not a quitter. 

It doesn’t get any better, though, and, one morning, when she’s at Gareth’s, she bursts into tears, for no reason, while making tea. She’d meant to make it and bring it back to Gareth in bed but, instead, she finds herself holding the counter with both hands, crying so hard it hurts. 

Gareth comes in and says, sleepy and confused, “Lou? Lou, what?” She’s crying too hard to answer him. He comes and settles his hand on her back. “Lou?” She turns blindly into him and he gathers her close. “Lou?” He sounds so worried but all she can do is bury her face in his chest and cry. He holds her until she stops. He rubs her back and makes low, murmuring, comforting sounds. She loves him _so much_ , she thinks, loves the sheer, solid, steadiness of him. 

When she finally lifts her head, he says, “Lou, what’s this, I mean--” 

“I’m sorry,” she says, “I don’t know--”

“Hush,” he says, rubbing his thumb along her cheek, “You don’t have to be sorry. Just tell me what’s wrong and we’ll--we’ll fix it, all right?”

She wishes she knew what was wrong. “I--”

He kisses her, slow and soft, pure comfort, and says, “Go sit, eh? I’ll make the tea.”

She goes and curls up on the sofa. Months after moving in, he’s yet to acquire any other furniture to go with it, so it and the television are still the only things in the sitting room. She sits there and tries to think of the words to explain why he’d found her in tears.

He comes in, a mug in each hand, and sits down next to her. He hands her a mug. For a few minutes, he lets her sip her tea and doesn’t say anything. Then he says, “Well, do you, I mean--”

“I don’t know,” she says, “I really-- I don’t know what’s wrong.”

He wraps his arm around her shoulders. “Are you-- I mean, is it us, me? What’s--”

“No!” she says, surprising herself with her vehemence, “No, not you, or us. That’s fine. I--”

He squeezes her shoulders. “What?”

She takes a sip of tea. “I--I think, maybe, I think I may’ve made a mistake.” It’s as far as she can get. She can scarcely believe she’s said it out loud.

“What sort of mistake?” There’s no judgement in his voice just concern. It makes it easier to answer.

“Uni, I don’t--” She puts her tea down on the floor. “You need a table,” she says. nonsensically, “Really, Gareth, there’s more to furniture than sofas. How hard would it be to go out and buy a table? Really?” He lets her ramble without comment. “I, oh, _Gareth_ , I hate it.” She’s crying again, hot, silent tears that she tries furiously to will away. “Not my courses, but, I don’t know, I just, I can’t-- I--” She scrubs her hand over her face.

“Hey,” he says, leaning forward and wrapping his arm around her again. “It’s all right. If--if you hate it, if-- It’s all right, Lou. You can-- You don’t have to continue. You can do anything you want, you know that, right?”

It’s exactly what she’d expected him to say, and it just makes her cry a bit harder. “Oh, Gareth, my mum, if I--if I stop, she’ll, _oh_ , she’ll be so disappointed. I--”

He rubs her back. “Lou,” he says quietly, “You didn’t go just--just to make her happy, did you?”

“No,” she says, right away, “No. I didn’t.” It’s true; well, she didn’t go _just_ because of that. “I don’t know, Gareth, I just-- I didn’t know what to do and it seemed, at the time, it seemed the best idea. And it did make her happy--so happy.”

“But,” he says, “You’re not happy. Are you Lou?”

She shakes her head. “No. No I--”

“What,” he says, “would make you happy?”

“I don’t know,” she says helplessly, “I just, Gareth, I don’t know.”

“Well,” he says, “We’ll--we’ll figure it out, okay?” and she believes him.

She finishes the semester, in the end, because she just can’t bear to leave in the middle. It’s going to be bad enough, telling her parents, her mum, that she’s not going back, but it would've been so much worse if she’d up and left in the middle of the semester. 

She doesn’t tell anyone she’s not going back. She wants to hold that decision close until the semester is over. It feels right. She doesn’t feel like she belongs there, in the midst of her classmates and their grand ambitions for the future. The only thing, she knows she really wants, if she’s honest (and she’s forced herself to be), is what her mum has, what Mrs. Barry has; she wants a family, eventually she wants children, wants to stay home and care for them, the way her mum did with her. She wants that with Gareth. She wants that more than anything else. 

She’s not sure that’s a thing she’s supposed to want. Some part of her’s still sure she should have some higher ambition, something else to aspire to. She knows that’s what her mum wanted, why she pushed so hard for her to attend university. But she’s not sure it’s for her. Maybe it is and she just hasn’t figured it out yet, just hasn’t figured out what she really wants from life. Maybe she will one day and she’ll go back. But, for now, she can’t stay. 

Gareth’s infinitely patient with her, not pushing her about what she’s going to do. She wants to tell him her decision first but she feels she owes her parents, her mum, to tell them first. 

She’s expecting a fight, expecting her mum to shout and scream but, instead, her mum just says with quiet certainty, “This is about that boy, isn’t it?” She hates it when her mum talks about Gareth that way, like he’s nobody, like they haven’t been together for over three years now. 

“No,” she says, as calmly as she can manage, “This isn’t about Gareth.” It’s not. It’s about what she wants, or, at least, about trying to figure out what she wants, while that definitely includes Gareth, this isn’t about him. “Uni, it’s--it’s just not for me. I--I--”

Her mum doesn’t say anything she just shakes her head, gets up and walks straight out of the room. It’s worse than all the screaming and shouting in the world. 

She can’t stay in the house. She leaves, goes to Emma and stays with her in her new flat. 

She talks to Gareth, tells him what she’s decided. She expects him to ask her, straight away, to come live with him but he surprises her by not mentioning it at all. He just passes on his mum’s invitation to come over on Christmas and tells her that she’ll figure out what to do next. “If I wanted,” she says tentatively, “could I still come and stay with you, would you want--”

He cuts her off, “Of course, _God_ , I’d like nothing better but only--only if that’s what you want.”

“I love you,” she says.

“Love you too.”

She’s still smiling long after they’ve hung up. Emma finally pokes her and says, “Take pity on a poor single girl and stop smiling like a besotted fool.” 

She pokes her back and says, “You said Gareth and I were boring and that you loved being single.”

Emma shrugs. “I did, didn’t I? Think I was right, too. Still, quit smiling, you look ridiculous.”

She can’t stay at Emma’s forever, though, and, after a day or so, she goes home and hopes her mum will talk to her.

She finds her mum sitting at the kitchen table a half-filled mug of tea in front of her. She stands in the doorway and stares for a moment. “Mummy,” she says. It’s not what she meant to say, she had this very reasonable, adult speech prepared in her head but, when she sees her mum, she forgets all the words. Her mum looks up. “I,” she says, “Mum, I-- I’m sorry.”

“Oh, Louise, sweetheart,” her mum says, “I know.” She gets up, comes over and pulls her close. She smells like she always has, lilac from the soap her dad gives her every Christmas and a hint of lemon. When Louise was younger, she could tuck her head under her mum’s chin, but now she’s taller than her mum. Still, she burrows as close as she can. 

It doesn’t fix anything, though, not really. They just don’t talk about it anymore.

***

She ends up moving in with Emma. Emma even gets her a job at the shop where she works. Gareth, she knows, was hoping for another outcome, but he says as long as she’s happy so is he.

She is happy. It’s not a permanent solution, or, really, a solution of any kind, but it gives her some space, some time to think. It’s miles better than university. She feels relaxed and happy. She has Emma and they kind of go crazy together, going out and all. She goes around her parents’ all the time and, even, around the Barrys’ fairly regularly. It’s everything, except Gareth, that she’d missed when she’d been away.

***

A little after the end of the season, Gareth gets called up to the senior side. There’s even talk he’ll go to Euros. From what she can gather, it’s down to someone else being injured. He’s over the moon, so’s his father, even Mrs. Barry, who tends to view football the way Louise does, as something that’s nice in that it makes Gareth happy, is excited. She’s excited too, it’s impossible not to be, what with the way Gareth’s lit up, and she is proud of him. But a part of her sees all that time she thought she’d have with him disappear, just like that, and resents it, resents England and Euros and football.

He ends up going. “You’ll watch?” he says, when they’re saying goodbye, “I know you don’t usually and I probably won’t play but will you?”

“Of course,” she says and kisses him, “I’ll watch every minute.”

He smiles. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

She watches the games with Emma down at the pub. Gareth doesn’t play a single minute. She’d never say it but she’s glad when England get knocked out at the earliest possible opportunity. She feels guilty, thinking it, but she just wants Gareth back.

He’s a bit quiet when he gets back. “Next time,” she says, “You’ll play and maybe--”

He smiles a little. “Yeah. Maybe.” That’s all he says about it. She feels like she should do more, say more, but she doesn’t know what.

He’s only been back a few days when he comes around, all amped up and smiling. It’s such a switch. She’s surprised. “Lou,” he says, “Lou, come away with me, yeah? We should take a proper holiday, go somewhere nice.”

“Well,” she says, hedging when all she wants to do is kiss his goofy, excited smile and agree, right then, to whatever he wants, “I’ll have to see if I can get off work.”

He tugs her into his arms. “Forget work, Lou.” He spins her around. “Where do you want to go?”

“Gareth,” she says, trying to be stern, “I can’t just forget it. I’ll have to see if I--”

He kisses her. “Yes, Lou,” he says, “You can. You don’t need it. You know that, right? I’ll--”

She stops him, presses her fingers to his mouth. “I like my job, Gareth. I’ll ask and then we’ll see, okay?”

He kisses her fingers and then gently draws her hand away from his mouth. “Okay,” he says, then more seriously, “But, Lou, I meant it, you don’t--” She kisses him because she doesn’t want to have that discussion, not right now. 

She’s able to get a few days off. She lets him plan the trip. He takes her to Spain. They stay in a place so posh neither of them are quite sure what to do with themselves the first day or so. They laugh about it and that makes it seem a little more familiar, reminds her that so long as they’re together they can figure anything out. 

Being away is nice, the weather’s gorgeous, the beach is out of this world, but, maybe, the real novelty, is having Gareth’s undivided attention. She almost doesn’t want to sleep at night. She wants to have every second that she can of his time before the season starts again and she loses him again. 

On their last night, they’re lingering over dessert, when Gareth takes her hands and says very seriously, “Lou, come back with me, when I go, come with me.” It’s unfair of him, she thinks, to ask her now, while she’s lulled with wine and amazing food, to ask her there, in the candlelight, with that hopeful, earnest look on his face.

“Gareth,” she says. All she wants to do is to say yes. 

He lifts one of her hands and kisses the inside of her wrist. “Please, Lou, at least think about it, okay?”

She disentangles her hands from his. “I--I want to, Gareth, but--”

“But?” 

She looks down at the table and fiddles with her fork. “Gareth--” She means to reiterate all the reasons why she shouldn’t, but she stops, considers if those reasons are _her_ reasons. She thinks, maybe, they’re her mum’s reasons, but not _her_ reasons. She’s not, naturally, a creature of impulse, but there, in the candlelight, she gives into impulse, into the truest desire of her heart and says, “Okay. Yes.” She looks up. “I will. I’ll come with you.” 

He leans right across the table and kisses her. It might be a mistake, she thinks, opening her mouth for him, but she finds she doesn’t care so much.

***

When she tells her parents, her mum is silent for one long, horrible moment and then she says, “Absolutely not, Louise, no. You can’t.”

As calmly as she can, she says, “You--you don’t get to decide, Mum, you and Dad, you don’t get to decide. I’m--”

“Why?” her mum snaps, cutting her off, “Why now? You don’t have to go, just continue as you have. What’s so wrong with that?”

“I love him, Mum, I want to _be_ with him, not just a weekend here or there but all the time. I--”

“Louise,” her mum interjects, “you’re young, there’s so much time for--”

“No,” she says, her calm slipping just a bit, “No. This is what I-- _we_ want.” She glances at her dad, hoping for some help, or at least, a friendly face. He just looks uncomfortable. “Mum,” she says, looking back at her, “ _Please_ , just-- This is what I want truly, please--”

“What are you going to do there, tell me Louise, you’re just going to go and what? What about going back to university? What about _you_? What if he, if you two--”

“Mum,” she interrupts, because she doesn’t want to hear her mum voice her own doubts, “He’s-- This is what I want. I’ll go, I’ll find a job, something, like here, but I want to be with him. I’ve--”

“You’ll have no one there, Louise, your family’s here, your friends are here, if things-- You’ll be alone Louise, just--”

“I won’t,” she snaps, losing the last slivers of her calm, “be alone. Gareth will be there. He’s-- And, anyway, it’s not like you and Dad will be so far away. It’ll be just fine.”

“I don’t like it,” her mum says, staring hard at her, “Louise, not even a little bit.”

She talks a slow, calming breath. She hates to disappoint her mum but she’s not backing down, not giving in. “You--you don’t have to, Mum, but I’m--I’m going.” 

“Fine,” her mum says, pushing back from the table, “If it ends badly, though, you can’t say I didn’t warn you.” She leaves, the door of the kitchen clattering shut behind her.

Louise presses the heels of her hands against her eyes and tells herself she’s not going to cry. “Louise,” her dad says softly, “sweetheart, look at me.” She drops her hands and looks at him. He smiles a little. “She--she only wants what’s best for you, you know that, right?” 

“I know,” she says, “I do, but Dad, this, Gareth, it’s--”

He pats her hand. “It’s what you want, I know.” 

She tries to smile. “It is, truly, Dad, it is.” 

He looks at her quite seriously. “Are you sure, Louise?”

She nods. “Yes. I’m sure.” 

“Okay,” he says, “Then it’s what you should do.” He smiles. “I’ll talk to your mum.” He gets up. In the doorway, he turns back and says, “If--if things don’t work out the way you hope, then--then your mum and me, we’ll be right here, understand?” 

She nods. “Yeah. Thanks, Dad, really, I--I understand.”

She goes back to her flat in a bit of a daze. Emma looks up when she comes in. She looks her over then says, “You all right, Lou? Are you-- Is it your parents? Your mum, your dad--” 

“No! No,” she says, forgetting she hasn’t told Emma yet, “I just-- I told them I’m going back with Gareth, that I’m going--”

“Wait,” Emma says, “You’re what? Lou, what’re you going on about? You’re _leaving_?”

“Oh,” she says, “Right, I was going to tell you next. I’m--”

Emma cuts her off. “Lou, think you should sit down. You look awful.”

“Okay,” she says, “Right. I’ll just--” She collapses onto the sofa next to Emma. “Just.” 

Emma pats her knee. “Right then. I’ll get some wine. You can tell me all about it, all right?”

She hasn’t had anything to eat since lunch and she’d really barely touched it so wine’s probably the last thing she needs but, still, it seems a really excellent idea. “Okay, yeah, that--that’d be good.” 

Emma comes back with the whole bottle of wine. She switches off the telly and sets the wine down on the table. “Here,” she says, handing Louise a glass.

She takes the glass. “Really, Em,” she says, gesturing toward the bottle, “the whole bottle?” 

Emma clinks her glass against Louise’s and says, “Think we’re going to need it.” She curls up in the corner of the sofa. “Now. Talk. Start with how you’re leaving me to go shack up with Gareth.” 

Louise takes a sip of wine, then another for good measure. “When we were in Spain, he, ah, he asked me and--”

“Again,” Emma interjects. She’s the only one that knows Gareth’s asked before. “And you finally said yes, huh?”

Louise takes another sip of wine. “Yeah, I, yeah, I did.”

“Is it,” Emma says softly, “truly what you want?” She can’t tell by looking at Emma if she thinks it’s a good or bad idea. Emma teases her all the time about how by having Gareth means she has it made, but she’s never sure if it’s just a tease or if Emma means it and, if she does, whether or not she thinks it’s a good thing. 

“Yes,” she says and, for the first time when making a decision about her future, she finds she means it absolutely.

“Well,” Emma says. She takes a sip from her glass then raises it. “All right then. To you and Gareth.” 

Louise smiles and clicks her glass against Emma’s. “Cheers, Em.” 

Emma settles back and says more seriously, “S’what you always wanted, isn’t it? Not university or whatever, just this.” 

Louise swallows the rest of her wine. “Think so, maybe.” 

“Then I’m happy for you, Lou, truly.” 

It’s nice to hear that someone is. “Thanks.” 

After a moment, Emma says softly, “Your parents, they...”

Louise raises her glass, remembers it’s empty and ends up just fiddling with it. “My mum, she--she--”

“More wine?” Emma says.

“God, yes.” She holds out her glass and Emma refills it. She takes a few sips. 

“Your mum?” Emma prompts. 

“She, _oh_ , Em, she hates the idea. She--she--”

“Why?” 

“I dunno, she thinks we’re too young, thinks-- She wants something else for me, she, she made it out like Gareth would just--just, you know, and I’d be-- Em, _oh_ , I don’t know.” She scrubs her hand across her eyes. She won’t cry about this. She made her decision, the decision she wanted to make, she won’t cry about it. 

“ _Oh_ , Lou,” Emma says softly, “She just, she wants what she thinks is best for you.” 

Louise looks up. “This,” she says, as firmly as she can, “This is what’s best for me, Em, this is what I want. It’s--it’s maybe not what she--what she wanted but I want it. I--I love him and I want to be with him.” 

“Okay,” Emma says, “Okay, Lou. She’ll, your mum, she’ll come ‘round, you’ll see.” She scoots over and wraps her arm around Louise’s shoulders. “You’ll see.” 

Louise drains her glass. “I-- Oh, Em, I hope so. I don’t-- I hate it when she...”

Emma squeezes her shoulders. “I know, Lou, I know.” 

She drops her head down onto Emma’s shoulder. “Oh, Em, m’gonna miss you.” 

“I’ll,” Emma says, resting her head on top of Louise’s, “miss you too.” She gives Louise a little shake. “Mind you, if you don’t come visit, I’ll be quite put out.” 

Louise laughs a little. “‘Course I’ll visit. You can come visit me too.” 

“Too right. I’ll visit so much you’ll be sick of the sight of me.” 

“I could never be sick of the sight of you.” 

“Oh, _Lou_.” Emma says and squeezes her tight. She’s going to, she thinks, miss Emma and their cozy little flat quite desperately. “Now,” Emma says, letting her go, “Enough of this. Let’s have more wine, order some food, and talk about just how nice it’ll be to have your own place with Gareth.” 

They don’t really end up talking about Gareth at all. They drink lots of wine, eat really bad pizza from the place around the corner and giggle over the ridiculous film they end up watching. She falls asleep on the sofa and doesn’t wake up until the next morning when her mobile rings. 

Emma’s curled up at the other end of the sofa. She sits up a bit and blinks at Louise. “S’that, shit, Lou, s’that your mobile?”

Louise’s head is aching and she’s not sure where her mobile is. “Yeah. Yeah. Hold a minute, it’s just--” She finds it on the floor, half under the sofa. “Hello?” she says.

“Lou?” It’s Gareth. He’s very loud.

“Yeah,” she says, straightening up, “S’no need to shout.”

“I’m not,” he says, “Lou? Are you? What’s--”

She sits up a bit. Her stomach lurches unpleasantly. “M’fine. Just had a bit too much wine, I think.” 

“Oh,” he says, “Did--did it go that badly then, with your parents?”

“No,” she says, “Well, yes, but that’s not-- Em and I, we were just--”

“Right,” he says, “but your parents--”

She cuts him off, “Gareth, all I want now is a shower and, maybe, something for my headache, can we-- Later, okay?” 

“Sure,” he says, “I’ll come by ‘round lunch, maybe?” 

“Yeah,” she says, “sure. Now I really-- I’ll see you then, all right?”

He comes round later and takes her out to lunch. She even almost feels like eating. He doesn’t push her to talk. He’s good at that, at letting her take things at her own pace, he always has been. He just tells her funny stories about being in the England camp and smiles this ridiculously, pleased smile every time she laughs. 

Once she’s most of the way through her lunch and she feels a bit steadier, she says carefully, “My mum, she--she’s not happy. She doesn’t want me to, you know...”

“Are you,” he says hesitantly, “going to, Lou, are you...”

“No,” she says, “No. I’m coming with you. That’s what I want. She’ll--she’ll just have to--to--” 

He smiles a little. “I’m glad but, Lou, I don’t--I don’t want to, you know...”

“Oh, Gareth,” she says, “It’s not you, not really, she just, she wanted me to--to--” 

He ducks his head and pokes at his chips. “Go back to uni? To--to--”

“Something like that.” She doesn’t want to tell him the other things she’d said.

“Is that,” he says, raising his head, “Do you want that, Lou? Tell me, ‘cause I, I want you with me, but I--I want you to have what you want, to do what you want.” 

She takes his hand. “Gareth, I’m doing what I want, understand? This, us, that’s what I want. Do--do you? I mean...”

He smiles. “”Course I do, do you even have to ask? This is exactly what I want, what I’ve always wanted.” 

She squeezes his hand. “Good, that’s--that’s good.” 

“Your mum,” he says, “she’ll come round.”

She pulls her hand back. “Yeah. Hope so.” She picks up her drink and takes a sip. “Your parents, did you? What did they say?” He ducks his head and blushes a bit. “Gareth?”

He looks up and smiles a bit ruefully. “My mum asked me when I thought we might get married.” 

She almost drops her glass. “Gareth?”

“Aw, Lou,” he says, laughing, “Don’t look so panicked. Would it be so bad, being married to me?” 

She considers tossing what’s left in her glass straight at him. “Gareth, be serious. What did you say to her?” 

“I told her we weren’t quite there yet.” 

She puts down her glass. Marriage, _God_ , she’s not ready for that. Not now. Not even as a joke. “Right. Good. So--so they were all right, then with, you know, with the other?” 

“Yeah,” he says, then he takes her hand and adds very seriously, “Would you want that, though, someday, you know, with me?”

“I,” she says, feeling a bit dizzy, “Yeah, think I would.” 

He smiles. “Me too, I mean, with you. I would.”

***

Everything seems to fly after that. She quits her job. She helps Emma try and find a new flatmate. She packs and makes plans with Gareth for moving. She calls her parents every day but her mum won’t speak to her. Her dad tries to make light of it, tries to distract her with endless amounts of advice about moving, but all she really wants is to hear her mum’s voice.

She can’t bear the idea of leaving with her mum so angry with her so, one day, instead of calling, she goes over to the house and hopes for the best. 

She still has a key so she lets herself in instead of ringing the bell. She finds her mum sitting at the kitchen table. Her mum looks up when she comes into the room but she doesn’t say anything. Louise sits down across from her. “I’m leaving,” she says, “Soon.”

“When?”

“Couple of weeks.” Her mum nods but doesn’t say anything. “Mum,” she says, “Please. Can’t you--” This is what I want. This, I--I think this is what’ll make me happy, can’t you--”

Her mum reaches across the table and takes her hand. “I hope it does, sweetheart, I hope it does.” She sounds tired and a bit disappointed but she’s not shouting or repeating her previous objections. 

Louise will take what she can get. “I’ll--I’ll--” She squeezes her mum’s hand. “Miss you, Mum.”

Her mum smiles. “I’ll miss you too.” She disentangles their fingers and pats Louise’s hand. “Make us some tea, love, would you?”

She makes the tea and they sit and talk about other things, inconsequential little things, for hours, until her dad comes home. “Oh,” her mum says, when he comes in, “I forgot all about supper.”

Her dad smiles and says, “No matter. Let’s go out, shall we? My treat.”

“Oh,” her mum starts to say.

“C’mon,” her dad interjects, “Can’t remember the last time I took my girls out. Go get your bag and things.”

***

In the beginning, she finds herself thinking, more than once, that missing Gareth was easier than living with him. They have what seems like an endless series of niggling, little rows over all the things they could ignore when she was just visiting but can’t when they’re there in their faces day after day. Like how he’s disgustingly tidy and wrinkles his nose if she so much as leaves her shirt on the floor or how he still barely has furniture or how neither one of them really likes to do the washing up. It’s just one thing after the other.

In truth, those type of things aren’t really the problem. 

They start to, somewhat haphazardly, take turns with the washing up. Gareth actually does it a bit more than she does. She tries her best to remember not to leave things all over the floor and, when she forgets, Gareth will pick up after her. Usually he’ll roll his eyes a bit but he does it anyway.

He tells her that, if she wants furniture, to just go and buy some. She does, slowly at first, because she feels odd spending Gareth’s money. He teases her, says, “Didn’t realize you were gonna do this one chair at a time.”

“Oh, shut it,” she snaps. He laughs and she pokes him. “I--I just--” She stutters to a stop, unsure how to say the next part, unsure _what_ to say. “I don’t want to, it’s a bit weird--”

He looks totally bewildered. “Lou?”

“I don’t want to spend too much,” she blurts. It’s close enough to the truth.

He frowns a little. “What’ya mean? Just get whatever you like, yeah?”

She looks down and reaches up to fiddle with her necklace. “I, uh, it’s your money and I--I--”

“Hey,” he says, putting his hands on her hips, “Hey, Lou, look at me, huh?” She looks up. He smiles and gives her a glancing kiss. “S’ours, yeah? Whatever I’ve got, s’yours too. All right?”

She smiles a little, for him really, not for herself. “Okay,” she says. She’s not sure it really is, that she really quite believes him or that she necessarily _wants_ to. 

She buys the rest of the furniture in a kind of dizzying rush. She doesn’t feel any less uneasy doing it but, at least, it’s over.

She tries to explain her uneasiness to Emma but Emma says with direct matter-of-factness, “Lou, he’s paying the rent, yeah? And for just about everything else, how’s this any different?”

“I dunno,” she says, because she’d known all that but never thought about it. She’s never really thought about how Gareth spends money before now, not even when he’s spent it on her. “He’d do that anyway. This, it’s, Em, I don’t know.”

“So,” Emma says, “When you get a job, offer to help with stuff but, Lou, he’s always going make more than you ever could, no matter what you do.”

“I know--” she starts to say, but Emma interrupts.

“He wants to, Lou, Gareth’s mad for you, always has been, and he wants you with him, wants to share what he has with you, there’s nothing wrong with letting him, is there?”

She doesn’t have an answer just a kind of lingering, restless uneasiness. “Oh, Em, no, I suppose not, I just-- Guess I’m being silly.”

“No,” Emma says firmly, “You’re not. You just have to decide what you’re okay with, yeah? And work it out with him, right?”

The conversation she and Gareth have about it is one of the most difficult and awkward conversations they’ve ever had. Even the conversations after they’d gotten back together hadn’t been like this. It’s all exacerbated by the fact that Gareth quite obviously doesn’t understand why they’re even having the conversation. 

He stares at her blankly when she explains and says, “Don’t understand, Lou, what’s--what’s the big deal?”

“I can’t,” she say, “I don’t want you to just pay for everything. I--”

“Why not,” he interrupts, “I can afford it and Lou, I told you, it’s ours, yeah? Whatever I’ve got it’s--”

“It’s not, though,” she says, cutting him off, “not really, and I-- I’m not comfortable with just--just letting you...”

He looks baffled and a bit hurt. “I don’t,” he says, “It doesn’t bother me, Lou, truly, I--”

“It bothers _me_.” She doesn’t intend to sound so vehement but it just comes out that way.

Her vehemence visibly sets him back. He scrubs his hand through his hair the way he always does when he’s nervous or uncomfortable, and says, “Oh, I, Lou, I never--never, you know, I didn’t think about it, really, you know? I just--just wanted you here. Didn’t really think about nothing else.” He smiles a little, quick and nervous. “Just wanted you here. With me.”

“Oh, Gareth, “ she says, hooking her fingers over her necklace and running her thumb along the chain, “I--I didn’t think about it either. I wanted to come, to be with you, but I--I didn’t think.” She ducks her head. “Christ, somewhere my mum’s saying, _I told you so, Louise._ ” 

He laughs a little. “Yeah. No doubt.” She looks back up. He’s not smiling anymore, just staring at her a nervous sort of look on his face. “Lou,” he says, slow and hesitant, “What--what’ya want to do? You don’t-- Y’haven’t decided this--that it was a mistake? Do you want to go back? Home, I mean?” 

She reaches out and puts her hand on his thigh. He’s so tense, like his whole body is braced for disappointment. “No,” she says, “Gareth, no. I don’t. I want to stay here, with you. But--but we’ve got to think a bit. Work this out.”

He puts his hand over hers. “‘Kay. We can do that. Whatever you like.”

They work out a compromise. She knows that he’s doing it for her, that, if it were up to him, he’d just take care of them both, but she needs this and he gives it to her without hesitation. 

She feels better, after, like, maybe they can really make this whole living together thing work. She’s still unsettled in other ways, though, all the little (and not so little) adjustments that’ve come with living together, they aren’t really the problem. He has a life here, built up over the years, centered around football and his mates and she’s not sure where she fits.

For his part, Gareth, just assumes that she’ll be part of that life. He takes her along with him and his mates, doesn’t even ask, just assumes she’ll come along, be part of his routine. It’s not altogether bad, it’s just not _hers_. She’s used to having her own life, separate from Gareth’s. In a lot of ways, their relationship has existed in isolation from the other parts of their lives. Sure, she’s gone out with Gareth and his mates at home but she’d known most of them already plus she’d had her own mates, her own things to do. Here, all there is, is Gareth’s life, and she’s not sure she slots into it as neatly as Gareth assumes. Here everything is so different she’s not sure she _wants_ to. 

The first time she goes out with Gareth and his teammates, she’s completely unprepared for the attention they, well, Gareth and his teammates, receive. She feels like everyone is staring. She inches closer to Gareth who wraps his arm around her and turns away from his conversation with Michael to whisper, “You all right?”

“I, just,” she whispers back, “There’s so much, dunno, it feels like everyone’s staring.” 

He wrinkles his nose. “Yeah, I know, it’s a bit weird, isn’t it?” He tugs her a bit closer. “You get used to it, or, you know, that’s what the other lads say.” She’s not sure she ever will, isn’t sure she even _wants_ to. 

It’s not bad, though, being out with Gareth and his mates. She doesn’t really know any of them, aside from Michael, who’s been about since she first started going with Gareth, but they seem nice enough. 

In truth, in spite of the staring and the more expensive place, it’s basically like going out with Gareth’s mates at home. 

She tells Emma that and Emma laughs. “So much for the glamorous lifestyle of footballers, eh? Might just as well be down at the pub having a pint.”

“Think,” Louise says, “I might prefer that actually.”

Emma laughs some more. “Oh, poor Lou, you weren’t meant for this whole footballer’s wife business, were you? And Gareth’s not even that big yet, is he? What will you do if that happens?

“Oh, Em,” she says, “Let’s not-- Just it was a bit easier back home where no one made a fuss.”

“Well, Lou,” Emma says, “Reckon you’ll just have to get used to it. ‘Sides, you and Gareth are so boring, doubt anyone will take much notice.”

“Oi, Em--”

Emma just laughs. “Well, Lou,” she says, “you’re not exactly Posh and Becks, are you?” and Louise has to laugh with her just imagining Gareth getting up to the sort of things Beckham does. 

Still, she starts to say no when Gareth goes out with his mates. Not all the time, but some of the time. He pouts a bit and tries to convince her to go, but she just shoos him off and tells him to have fun. 

He comes back one night, earlier than she’d expected. He’s a bit pissed. He flops on the sofa next to her and gives her a slow, kind of dirty, sloppy-in-the-best-way kiss. “Missed you, Lou, s’not as much fun, you know, without you.” 

“Oh?” she says, snuggling against his side.

He tucks his arm around her shoulders. “S’not. We--we should do stuff, yeah? Just you and me. We haven’t-- I’ve-- Just used to all them, going out with them, all that. But--But you’re here now.” He kisses her again. “And--and we should--we can do our own thing, yeah?”

So they do. So many things that, finally, she says, “Just go out with them, I--I need, just go have a pint or whatever and let me, dunno, just off with you.” 

“Really?” he says. He looks hurt. “Lou, I thought...”

“Yes,” she says, “But, Gareth, they’re your mates, you should, you know, do whatever, like you would if we were at home.”

He takes her hand. “But, I thought, you know, you liked us, you know...”

She squeezes his hand. “I do, but Gareth, you don’t have to ditch your mates or whatever. We’ll just, we can do both, it’s not, you know, one or the other.” 

He kisses her and says, “Okay. Guess I’ll--” He kisses her again. “I’ll see you when I get home.” He smiles brilliantly when he says _home_ , like it’s the best word ever. They have a home, she thinks, her and Gareth, they have a home of their own. It is pretty brilliant.

“Yeah,” she says, kissing him, “I’ll see you when you get home.”

***

The problem is, outside of Gareth and his mates, she doesn’t know anyone here. She doesn’t have what she’d had at home, her own mates to go out with, her own things to do. Gareth’s solution to this, is to, somewhat awkwardly, introduce her to some of his teammates’ wives and girlfriends. They’re all nice enough but, for the most part, all they have in common is what their husbands and boyfriends do for a living. Still, she goes out with some of them a few times. They take her around the Bull Ring. She’s been a few times before but it’s different going with people who really know their way around it. She goes a few other places with them and they tell her other places to go, tell her places _not_ to go. It’s nice, as far as it goes, but it doesn’t really make them friends. Mostly it just makes her miss Emma and her other mates, makes her miss people who look at her and see Louise not just Gareth Barry’s girlfriend.

Emma comes for a visit and they go out together, check out some of the clubs and bars along Broad Street. They leave Gareth at home, he pouts a bit but he waves them off, tells them to have fun. Emma goes back home and, without her around, Broad Street’s bustle doesn’t have the same appeal. She does some aimless wandering around Edgbaston and Selly Oak. She even does a bit of exploring of the rest of the city. It’s so big, compared to home, and she feels a touch out of place. She’s bored enough that she even checks out some of the more touristy spots. She actually quite likes the Botanical Gardens and she goes back several times. It’s nice just to sit in them. 

It all gets a bit dull, though, after awhile. She’s used to having something to do, something to fill her days. She starts looking for a job in earnest, something to fill the seemingly unending amount of time Gareth fills with football, something to help her contribute, to give her something of her own. She knows that to be with Gareth is to be with football as well. She’s learnt that football always comes first. She tells herself football’s not a person, it’s a job, that she’s the only _person_ Gareth’s committed to, the only one he loves. She can handle it, coming in behind football, as long as she’s not coming in behind anything--anyone else. She’s learned how, become accustomed to it; after all, she’s had years of practice. That doesn’t mean she wants to sit around all day waiting for her time with Gareth.

In the end, it’s not that hard to find a job. She takes a part time job in an office, filing, answering phones, that sort of thing. She doesn’t tell Gareth until she actually has it. 

Even after all their discussions about money and other things, he doesn’t really understand why she wants the job. She’s not sure what he’d thought she’d do here, after she came here to be with him. She’s fairly certain he hadn’t thought about it all, hadn’t thought past her being with him all the time. She’s done, and still does, enough waiting around for him. She’s not looking to make it a full time occupation.  
He doesn’t try and talk her out of it, though, just somewhat bewilderedly says, “Whatever makes you happy.”

She likes her job - not the work, so much, which is, in truth, deadly dull - but being around the other girls in the office. They all get on fairly well and it’s nice to have that, to have mates, her mates, people she can call up to go out with or shop with or just to chat with. It’s not like having Emma nearby or her other mates from home but it’s nice. It gives her something to hang onto in this new place, something that’s just hers. 

She doesn’t tell them about Gareth, though, what he does. She remembers university, the staring, the strangeness of people’s reactions. She thinks of the staring when she goes out with Gareth and his teammates. She doesn’t want that in her own life. Not if she can help it. She tells them vaguely that he works in sport but doesn’t say anything else. It lets her just be _Louise_ instead of _Louise whose boyfriend plays for Villa_. She feels a bit guilty about not telling but she likes it better this way. 

His parents come to visit in November and their arrival disrupts a routine she hadn’t even realized they’d created. She’s become accustomed to the rhythm of their days, the ways her and Gareth’s schedules mesh, the way they have breakfast together every morning he’s in town, the way he’ll pick up dinner at least once a week, usually on Wednesdays, the way they curl up on the sofa and watch trashy shows on telly (but never Match of the Day) on nights after home games. 

Then his parents show up for a week long visit and she feels off kilter again, as if being out of sync with a routine that’s barely months old, has, somehow, knocked her askew. 

It’s not that it isn’t nice to see them, or that they even need anything in particular from her or Gareth. They know the city so well, by now, it’s not like they need to be guided around. Still, she feels as if she has to entertain them. Gareth’s no help, either, he’s short and distracted, the team’s on a terrible run, and he says, “I can’t, Lou, I don’t have time to, you know, can’t you just?”

“They’re _your_ parents,” she can’t stop herself from snapping, “Gareth, you--”

“Please,” he interjects, “Please, Lou, can’t you?” 

So she does. She makes plans for dinners and shopping and whatever she can think of to give them a nice visit. She manages the three of them, works around Gareth’s schedule (and her own) and tries to get them as much time together as she can. She even makes dinner one night. 

She calls her mum in a panic half way through cooking and her mum talks her slowly down. “Have some wine, love,” she says, “and take a breath. It’ll be okay.” So she sips her wine and, for a moment, wishes quite desperately that her mum was _there_ , in her kitchen, helping her make sure that the roast isn’t raw in the middle. 

“You should come,” she says, “visit, Mum, you and Dad.” 

“I’ll see you at Christmas, right, love? That’ll be soon enough.” She’s still hoping, Louise knows, that she’ll come back home, that she’ll go back to university. 

“Of course, Mum.”

She doesn’t undercook dinner or burn it. After dinner, while Gareth and his dad have a long, boring, football related conversation, his mum insists she show her around the flat. “I thought,” she says, whispering conspiratorially in Louise’s ear, “That he’d never buy furniture. This all looks lovely.”

“Thank you,” Louise says, “I, uh, just, he didn’t even have tables or-- I couldn’t--” 

Mrs. Barry pats her arm. “‘Course not, love. It really looks nice. ‘Course I expect you’ll move sooner rather than later. Maybe a house.” She looks expectantly at Louise. She’s not sure what to say. She has the distinct feeling that Mrs. Barry has very definite ideas about how her and Gareth’s relationship is going to proceed. 

“I,” she stammers, “I don’t, I mean, not now, I don’t think.”

“No,” Mrs. Barry says with a smile, “But soon?”

“Why don’t we,” Louise says, “go have pudding. Bet we can get their attention back for that.”

“Your mum,” she says, as they’re skirting around each other in the bathroom, getting ready for bed, “thinks we ought to have a house.” 

Gareth gapes rather unattractively around his toothbrush and says, “She what?”

She elbows him out of the way so she can reach the toothpaste. “A house. She kept going on about it.”

“What,” he says slowly, “did you say?”

“What do you think I said? I said not now.”

“Oh,” he mumbles around his toothbrush, “Right. ‘Course not.” He actually looks a bit disappointed. She decides to ignore that.

By the end of the week, she’s exhausted from trying to keep the Barrys entertained, from work, from constantly having to chivvy Gareth into a better mood so he doesn’t spoil his parents' visit. 

On Friday, she makes four silly mistakes in a row at work and Jana leans over and says, “Louise, you all right?” 

“I, uh, I’m just-- Gareth’s parents are here, and he’s no help, so I’ve--” She fiddles with the ends of her hair. “You know, I’ve--”

Jana smiles. “Ah, I understand. When Dave’s mother comes, oh my God, that woman, nothing is good enough for her.”

“I,” Louise says, “like them well enough, I do, but--”

Jana pats her shoulder. “It’s exhausting, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll make you some tea,” Jana says, “You put those files in the right place.”

“Thank you, really, thank you.”

When the Barrys leave, after the game on Saturday, all she feels is relief. It also helps that Villa win, and Gareth’s all smiles for the first time in weeks. When they’re curled up together on the sofa, that night, she says, “Gareth, m’not doing this again, I mean, I’m happy to have them here, but you’ll have to help when they come back. I can’t--”

“M’sorry,” he says, “I know you did a lot for them and I, uh, thanks for that. Next time we’ll do something different, ‘kay?”

She snuggles closer. “Okay,” she says and steals the remote.

“Oi,” he says, "what’cha gonna do with that?”

“Watch what I like,” she says and switches channels. He doesn’t argue, which is good, because she’s in no mood for it.

***

There’s row after row when they make plans to go home for the holidays. Not between them but between each of them and their parents. Her mum wants her to come home and bring Gareth. His mum wants him to come home and bring her. “It’s ridiculous,” she tells him, “They live barely three streets apart.”

“I know,” he says, “But what’re we gonna do?”

In the end, she goes back to her parents’, and Gareth goes back to his. They have this vague idea that they’ll split Christmas Day even though he won’t even be there the full day (she’s staying longer).

It’s strange, staying in her childhood bedroom, tossing and turning and looking for Gareth, who’s decidedly not there. She can’t sleep. She wants to call him, see if he’s having the same problem. She doesn’t like it, being back to missing him, she’d thought she was done with that. 

When he comes over in the morning, she whispers, “Missed you.”

He pulls her close, kisses her and says, “Yeah, me too. Couldn’t sleep.” 

“Yeah, she says, “me neither.” She wraps her arms around his waist and lets herself cling a little. 

“Next year,” he says, keeping her in his arms, “we’ll get a hotel room or something or they could come to us or whatever.” 

She kisses him. “Sounds good to me.” 

They stay for awhile, to open gifts and the like. She’d put Gareth’s name along with hers on her parents' gifts. Her mum frowns a bit but she thanks them both. Gareth shrugs. “Thank Lou, she picked ‘em.”

Later, they go to his parents. She’d picked out their presents for Gareth’s parents too, and put both their names on them, same as with her parents. She’s sure Gareth’s father doesn’t notice but, when Mrs. Barry opens her gift, she smiles at her, and says, “Did you pick this, love? It’s beautiful.” 

“‘Course, she did, Mum,” Gareth says before she can say anything, “You know I’m rubbish at that.” 

His mum laughs, “Oh, you’re not so bad, still, maybe it’s best to let Louise do it. Especially if it’s going to lead to gifts like this one.”

“I’m glad,” Louise says, at a loss for anything else to say, “you like it.” 

They stay at his parents until Gareth has to leave. He has to be back for the game the next day. 

She stays a few days, sees Emma and her mates, spends time with her parents. When she’s getting ready to go, her mum says, “You’re happy, then, are you love?”

She nods. “I am, Mum, truly.”

Her mum stares hard at her. “Well, all right then. Don’t forget to call when you’ve made it back home.” 

It’s odd, hearing her mum call Birmingham her home, makes it seem real in a way it hadn’t quite before. She has a home that’s not her parents’, she has the start of something with Gareth, a _home_ with Gareth. “Right,” she says, giving her mum a hug, “‘Course, see you Mum, yeah?”

***

The rest of the season seems to fly by. It’s like she blinks and suddenly it’s May. Gareth insists she come to the last home game of the season. It’s the first game she’s gone to since his parents visited.

It’s a big production, she knows, all the players families there, kids all over. Even though they aren’t friends exactly, it’s still nice to see the other players’ wives and girlfriends. The players do the lap around the pitch at the end of the game with the kids. It’s sweet, really; she’s never been to this game before, never seen this before.

Halfway around the pitch, Gareth ends up with someone’s kid. She can’t quite see how it happens but Gareth finishes the walk around the pitch with the kid in his arms before handing him off to one of his teammates.

On the way home, she asks, “Whose kid was that, I mean, the one you were holding?”

“Oh,” he says, “Southgate’s youngest. Cute kid.” 

“Yeah,” she says, “Looked it,” and thinks, for just a moment, about how it would feel to watch Gareth do that with _their_ child. She doesn’t say anything, though, isn’t even sure what she’d say.

Later, when they’re tangled together in bed, he says, “You want them, though, right, Lou? Kids, I mean, you want them?”

In the dark she can’t quite make out his face, but he sounds raw and a bit exposed, like her answer’s really important to him. She presses as close as she can and says, “Yeah, I do.”

“With me?” he says, so quietly she can barely hear him.

She shifts a little so she can kiss him. “Yes,” she says, “Gareth, of course with you.”

She’s expecting, when he kisses her, for it to be fast and desperate, but it’s slow and achingly sweet. “Love you,” he says.

“Do you know,” she says, “what I was thinking earlier, when you were walking with the kid?”

“What?”

“I was thinking what it’d be like do see you do that with _our_ child.”

He kisses her again. “Someday, yeah?”

“Yeah,” she says, tucking her face into his neck, “Someday.”

***

The summer is different, somehow, from the ones before. Maybe because she’s accustomed to having Gareth around all the time, so she doesn’t feel the same need to cling to him, to get all the time she can with him before he leaves again. Everything feels more relaxed, more settled.

They go home a lot, together and separately, and, in mid July, he takes her to Barbados. It’s a lovely trip and it makes her the envy of all the girls in the office. She’s thought, on and off, about confessing to them what Gareth really does, but their reactions, some of them, to the trip, make her glad she hasn’t. She wants to keep her space where she’s just her, not simply Gareth’s girlfriend, for as long as she can.

The season starts, though, before she knows it, but, this time, she doesn’t have to say goodbye, this time they just slide easily into last season’s routine with little fuss.

Michael’s gone though, off to play for Bradford City. It’s left Gareth a bit at sea. She tells him, “It’s not like you’ll never see him again.”

“I know,” he says, “But we’ve always played together, since we were just kids.”

“I know,” she says, and doesn’t point out that Michael’s never gotten near the first team and they haven’t actually played together in years. “But you’re still mates, yeah? That hasn’t changed.”

He shrugs. “No. Guess not. Just thought we’d always play together, you know?”

“I know,” she says. She hesitates then adds, “Maybe you will again, you know, someday.”

He brightens a bit at that. “You think?”

“Sure,” she says, but she’s picked up enough of football to know it’s probably a lie. His career isn’t heading in the same direction as Michael’s, at least, not right now. Football’s fickle, though, she knows; one injury and Gareth could be looking at worse prospects than Michael. She wouldn’t care, not for herself - it’s Gareth she wants, football or no football – but she’s not sure what Gareth’s reaction would be. She knows it wouldn’t be good. Still, she doesn’t have to worry about that, not now. She pokes him. “Just call him up and tell him you miss him or whatever.”

He bats at her finger. “I don’t--”

She rolls her eyes. “You so absolutely do. Just call him and quit moping around the place.”

“M’not,” he says quite petulantly. 

She laughs. “Oh, you definitely are.”

“ _Lou._ ”

“Call him.”

Later, she almost regrets pushing him about it, because Michael starts visiting all the time. To the point that, one morning as he’s watching her make tea, she says, thinking of his things strewn all over the sitting room, “Might as well put a dresser in the sitting room, you stay on the sofa so much.”

He laughs. “Yeah. Thanks, yeah? For being so good about it and all.” 

She shrugs. “You’re his best mate, what else am I gonna do?”

He ducks his head. “Still, thanks.”

“S’no bother,” she says, “truly.”

He smiles. “It is a bit, I know.”

“Well,” she says, “maybe a bit. But we’re glad to have you, really.”

He laughs. “Just maybe not all the time?”

“Maybe not,” she concedes. 

Gareth comes in then, stumbling a bit and scrubbing the sleep out of his eyes. “What’cha talking about out here?”

She takes down another mug and says, “Nothing,” just as Michael says, “Just thanking Lou for being so good about me visiting.”

Gareth just looks confused. “Right,” he says and takes the mug of tea she hands him. He absently kisses her cheek. “Thanks, Lou.”

Michael still visits, of course, but, after that, it’s not as often. She’s sure it’s not just down to their conversation. The season gets busier, games coming thick and fast, and there’s no time. Gareth seems to be settled about it, anyway, moved on, Michael too, resigned to the inevitable temporariness of football where you can play with your best mate one season and the next you play in different divisions. 

“You’re not going anywhere,” Gareth says half in jest, one night over supper, “Right, Lou?”

“No,” she says, “M’not going anywhere.”

He smiles. “Good. M’glad,” he says and nudges his foot against hers. 

“How about you?” she asks.

“What?”

“You’re not going anywhere, are you?”

He smiles again and says, like it’s the most obvious thing ever, “Of course not, Lou, no place else I’d rather be.”

She smiles. “Same here,” she says and means it absolutely.

***

They’re coming into the last stretch of the season when she starts waking up feeling sick. The first time it happens, she barely makes it to the toilet before she’s sick. She stays there, on the floor, once it passes. She still feels a bit queasy. Gareth hovers in the doorway of the bathroom. “Lou?”

She looks at him and tries to smile. “S’all right,” she says, “Just something I ate, maybe.” 

He nods jerkily. “You sure?”

He doesn’t come any closer. She’s learned, long since, not to resent the way he stays away when she’s ill. She knows that, especially during the season, he can’t afford to be sick. She pushes up and goes to rinse out her mouth. She feels a bit better. “M’sure. Go on. Have breakfast. I’ll be okay.” 

“Do you,” he says, “Can I get you anything?”

The thought of food makes her stomach flip. “No. No, I’ll-- You go on.” 

She feels fine the rest of the day. 

When Gareth comes back, after training, he says, “Well? How are you?”

She smiles. “Fine. Really.” 

He doesn’t come kiss her, though, like he usually does. “Good,” he says and smiles.

It happens again the next morning, and the morning after that. The third time, Gareth inches into the bathroom and says a bit shakily, “Think you should go to the doctor. Get checked out.”

She rests her head against the rim of the toilet and thinks he has a point. “All right,” she says, “Today, I’ll--” 

“Good,” he says.

She wishes he’d come over. She’d like his hand on her back or, at least, some help up off the floor. She pushes herself up. “I’ll call this morning,” she says. 

She does call and she does go, but not where she’s sure Gareth’s expecting her to go. 

The doctor tells her exactly what she expects to hear. She makes her follow up appointment in a kind of a daze. Her first reaction had been a kind of fierce, dizzying joy but she holds that feeling close, doesn’t let herself give in to it. She doesn’t know what Gareth will say, how he’ll react. They weren’t trying for this. They’d talked about it, sure, but for later. This is a surprise, a good one, she hopes.

When Gareth gets home, he says right away, “Well? Are you-- You’re all right, yeah?”

She wants to ask him to come sit next to her, but she needs to be able to see his face. “I’m fine,” she says. 

He moves into the room. “What was it, then?”

She takes a deep breath. “Gareth, I’m--I’m pregnant.” 

His expression goes blank for a second - shock, she’s sure. She worries in that second, all the worst outcomes flashing through her mind, sending her heart racing. Then he smiles, wide and stunned, and says, “Really? Lou, truly?”

She nods. “Really.”

He hasn’t stopped smiling. “That’s-- Lou! Lou, we’re going to have a _baby_.” His voice is full of almost incredulous awe.

“Yeah,” she says, letting go of her tightly held happiness and allowing it to rush through her and into her words. “We are. A _baby_ , Gareth.”

He comes and sweeps her up off the sofa, kisses her and spins her around. She laughs and clutches at his shoulders. “Gareth! Gareth, put me down.”

He does, his expression turning panicked. “Shit. _Shit_ , Lou, I shouldn’t, right, ‘cause--” He’s smiling again. “A _baby_ , Lou, _God_ , that’s--” He kisses her again and again until she’s laughing and a bit breathless. Then he’s back to worried, hands on her shoulders, staring at her intently, saying, “You’re all right? I mean, what’d the doctor say?”

She loops her arms around his neck. “I’m fine, Gareth. I’ve another appointment soon but I’m fine. Truly.” 

He kisses her again, slowly this time, and with infinite sweetness. “Good,” he says, “That’s good, Lou.” He smiles. “I love you,” he says, “Lou, _God_ , a baby.” She kisses him.

The next day, when he comes home after training, he has pink roses, masses of them, she’s not sure she has enough vases he’s brought so many. She starts to get up, meaning to go help him with them but he says, “No. No, stay there.” He comes over and offers her the armful of roses. He goes to his knees to do it and she doesn’t think much of it, too busy trying to hold onto the roses, but then she realizes he hasn’t gotten up.

“Gareth?” He smiles a bit, like he does when he’s nervous. “Gareth?” she says again because he can’t be--

He fumbles in his pocket and takes out a small box. He actually is. “Lou--” 

She unceremoniously dumps the roses on the sofa next to her and puts her fingers over his mouth. “Gareth Barry,” she says, “If you’re doing this because I’m pregnant, I’m going to smack you, do you understand?” He smiles against her fingers. “I’m serious,” she says. 

He pulls her hand away. He holds up the box. “Do you know how long I’ve had this?” She shakes her head. “I bought it as soon as I could afford it. Was just waiting, you know, for the right moment. You’re--” He tips up and kisses her. “You’re it for me, Lou, everything, always have been.”

“Well,” she says, unable to keep her voice from shaking, “Best ask me properly then.”

He smiles. His smile is still as lovely as it was that Sunday afternoon, years ago, when they’d passed on the sidewalk and it still makes her feel just the same. He opens the box and holds it out, but she looks at his face. “Louise,” he says. His tone is a touch solemn and his voice shakes, “I love you. Will you marry me?”

It’s such a Gareth proposal. No fancy restaurant, no candlelight, no fancy speech, just them at home, him bringing her pink roses, like he’d brought her on their first anniversary and has brought her on every anniversary since, him saying just what needs to be said, nothing more. It’s all she needs, though, really, him there on his knees, looking at her like he always has, like she’s the center of everything. 

She holds out her hand. “Yes, oh Gareth, of course, I will.” 

He smiles and slides the ring onto her finger. It’s beautiful--simple but perfect. “You, ah,” he says almost bashfully, “d’you like it?”

“It’s perfect, Gareth.” She gets down on the floor with him so they’re face to face. She frames his face with her hands and kisses him. “I love you,” she says, “So much.” 

_Epilogue_

Her mum’s just adjusting her veil, when someone knocks on the door. Emma goes, opens it a crack and peeks out. She turns back. “S’Gareth. Shall I just tell him to piss off?” 

Louise shakes her head. “No,” she says. She can’t think what it could be but she knows it must be important if Gareth’s here, risking her mum’s wrath. “No. It’s all right. Let him in.”

Her mum says, “Louise, dear, he’s not--”

“I want,” she says, interrupting to forestall any argument, “him to come in. Emma, please.” Emma opens the door.

Gareth comes in. He’s all dressed in his suit and he has Freya in his arms. She’s fussing and crying, all red in the face. Oscar’s with him, too, and he rushes into the room, comes straight for her. “Mummy. Mummy,” he says, stopping right at the edge of her dress, “Freya’s crying. She won’t stop.”

She ruffles his hair. “Can see that, love.” 

“M’sorry,” Gareth says, he’s not even looking at her, he’s looking at Freya, bouncing her a bit. He looks up. “She, uh, she just wanted you, and--” He’s staring at her, open mouthed. “And I couldn’t-- God, Lou, you look, wow, you--” 

Freya starts to fuss then. “Mummy. Mummy.” She’s reaching out towards her.

Gareth bounces her some more. “I know, sweetheart, there she is. There’s Mummy. See?” 

Freya doesn’t quiet, though, she just cries harder. “Here,” she says, moving towards them, “Give her here.”

“Your dress,” her mum says faintly. 

“Sod the dress.” Oscar giggles. Gareth looks like he wants to as well. 

She takes Freya from Gareth. Freya cuddles close and says softly, “Mummy.” 

“That’s right, darling, here I am.” Gareth’s smiling at them, awestruck, like he’s never seen anything better.

“Up,” Oscar says. She’s not surprised. He hates to be left out of anything. “Up,” he says again, “Daddy.”

Gareth scoops him up. “There you go, buddy, better?” 

He loops his arms around Gareth’s neck. “Better,” he says and smiles.

It’s Louise’s turn to stare. Some part of her is aware that Emma’s ushering her mum out of the room but all she really sees are Gareth and Freya and Oscar. Gareth smiles. “You look amazing,” he says, “Sorry, you know, about--” 

She leans in and kisses him. Oscar giggles right in her ear. “Kiss me,” he says, “Mummy, me too.” Louise does. “And Freya,” he demands. She duly complies. 

“Well,” she says to Gareth, “Shall we?” 

“Okay,” he says and they go down together. 

When they get outside, the sun’s just peeking through the clouds. “Look,” Gareth says, “Lou, told you we’d have some sun.”

They give Freya and Oscar to his mum. Freya seems to have calmed and she goes without a fuss.

She tips up and kisses Gareth. “Now,” she says, “When I walk down the aisle, try to look surprised and appropriately awed.” 

He laughs a little and kisses her. “M’always awed by you, Lou.”

She shoves at his chest. “Oh, leave off.” 

He smiles and kisses her again. “S’true.”

“Oh, Gareth.”

He ducks his head, reminding her of the boy he’d been when they’d first met. “S’always been true.” 

She takes his hand. “For me too,” she says, “Now, shall we go do this thing properly?”

He squeezes her hand. “Yeah. Let’s go.”

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. This story was inspired, in large part, by the way Louise is referred to when the press talks about her, namely, as Gareth’s childhood sweetheart or as his longterm sweetheart and by this article, which claims that Gareth was her first boyfriend.  
> 2\. The Michael referred to in the story is Michael Standing who is a close friend of Barry’s (they were signed by Aston Villa at the same time). Standing is currently Barry’s agent.  
> 3\. The ages of the Barrys’ children are extrapolated from their listed ages in this article  
> 4\. Finally, just for fun, Gareth Barry at sixteen and eighteen.


End file.
